KEEGAN  ONEAL
UNIVERSITY OF OREGON
MLA 2017
EMERGENT   PUBLIC   SPACE
A FRAMEWORK FOR NEW GREEN URBAN COMMONS IN SAN DIEGO

iii
KEEGAN  ONEAL
Submitted in partial fulfillment for the Master of Landscape Architecture
Department of Landscape Architecture, University of Oregon
June 16, 2017
EMERGENT   PUBLIC   SPACE
A FRAMEWORK FOR NEW GREEN URBAN COMMONS IN SAN DIEGO
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vACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank my committee chair Liska and everyone else on the 
landscape architecture faculty for their guidance, patience, and wisdom. To 
my wonderful student peers – especially the ‘Fantastic Five’ in my MLA cohort 
– thank you for your friendship and love. To my family, thank you for your 
boundless support and for bearing with me through the wild ride of graduate 
school. I would also like to express my gratitude to the Boulevard Business 
Improvement Association, Bikes del Pueblo, Spurlock Landscape Architects, 
and everyone else I encountered during my work at PopUp15. This project 
would have been possible without your trust and enthusiasm.
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DEPARTMENTAL APPROVAL
Committee Chair:
Liska Chan, Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture
Committee Members:
Chris Enright, PhD., Landscape Architecture
David Hulse, Knight Professor of Landscape Architecture
Chair Approval Date
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ABSTRACT
Emergence can be defined as “the movement from low-level rules to higher-
level sophistication” (Johnson, 2001). Emergence helps to explain how 
systems develop and change, and there is a growing body of literature where 
emergence theory is used to explain urban environments as Complex Adaptive 
Systems (CAS). A challenge remains, however, to translate our understanding 
of emergence and CAS into operative guidelines for the design of resilient 
urban environments.
Several landscape architectural theories including Landscape Urbanism, 
Ecological Urbanism, and the writing of Rod Barnett have endeavored to 
reconcile our understanding of CAS with the act of designing urban landscapes. 
This project builds upon this discourse by applying Barnett’s description of 
emergence theory to the design of specific landscape phenomena called green 
urban commons (GUC). These niche landscape phenomena loosen existing 
institutional structures and allow novel forms of land use to materialize 
(Radywyl and Biggs 2013). Related to the nascent practice of iterative urbanism, 
GUCs take various forms and oœen involve the conversion of underutilized 
urban land into productive community assets. These landscapes are iterated 
and changed over time by stakeholders, and temporary land uses oœen 
transition to more fixed, institutionalized change.
The goal of this pragmatic research-through-designing project is to encourage 
the creation of GUCs in San Diego’s Mid-City and Southeastern communities as 
a means to improve resident quality of life and urban resilience. The explicit 
application of emergence theory is presented as a way to enhance the landscape 
quality of GUCs, and a framework is proposed to encourage and expedite the 
development of new GUCs on city-owned vacant land in San Diego. To assess 
the scalability of the framework’s prescriptive recommendations, portions of 
the framework process are applied to three vacant urban lots in the Mid-City/
Southeastern San Diego study area. The speculative impacts of these case 
studies are then discussed in light of Barnett’s criteria for civic landscapes that 
exhibit emergent characteristics.
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER
List of Figures
Key Terms
Introduction
The Work:
Study Area Definition
Pilot Project: PopUp15
Framework for New 
Green Urban Commons
Green Urban Commons 
Project Process
Site Selection and 
Existing Conditions
Assemblage Design 
Scenarios
Discussion
Appendix
Works Cited
PAGE
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xvii
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23
24
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48
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139
147
153
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LIST OF FIGURES
All Figures by Keegan Oneal unless otherwise noted. Photographs not 
referenced in text are intended to convey sense of place for San Diego’s 
Southeast and Mid-City communities.
Figure 1.1: Vacant Lot, Southeast San Diego
Figure 1.2: New Roots Community Garden
Figure 1.3: Piazza Duomo, Milan, Italy (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Figure 1.4: John Nolen plan for Venice, Florida (Source: City of Venice)
Figure 1.5: E¥lorescent Ecologies Master Plan, Zhenhai (Source: M. Abdul-Latif)
Figure 1.6: Initial Times Square pedestrian zone (Source: NBC New York)
Figure 1.7: Temporary plaza at Times Sq. (Source: RSVLTS.com)
Figure 1.8: Formal Pedestrian plaza by Snøhetta  (Source: adsttc.com)
Figure 1.9: New Roots Community Garden, San Diego (Source: JMS Reports)
Figure 1.10: Emergence Diagram
Figure 1.11: Landscape Type Diagram
Figure 1.12: Overall Research Project Structure
Figure 1.13: Experimental Design Process Diagram
Figure 1.14: Researcher workspace with drawings, models, and creative collage
Figure 1.15: Market Street Hillside Study Model
Figure 1.16: Martin Ave Study Models
Figure 1.17: PopUp15 Study Model with modular grid configurations
Figure 2.1.1: San Diego Context Map
Figure 2.1.2: Mural in Southeastern San Diego
Figure 2.1.3: Study Area Map
Figure 2.1.4: Study Area Socioeconomic Information
Figure 2.2.1: Images from the Cine Carretera event
Figure 2.2.2: Scheme A - Concept Diagram for PopUp15
Figure 2.2.3: Scheme B - Concept Diagram for PopUp15
Figure 2.2.4: Scheme C - Concept Diagram for PopUp15
Figure 2.2.5: Drawing used for fundraising e¥orts
Figure 2.2.6: PopUp15 preliminary design drawing - Option A
Figure 2.2.7: PopUp15 preliminary design drawing - Option B
Figure 2.2.8: Plan submitted to City for review with revision notes
Figure 2.2.9: Site plan revision notes from Development Services
Figure 2.2.10: PopUp15 plan approved by Development Services department
Figure 2.2.11: Bikes del Pueblo Volunteers constructing posts for shade sails
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Figure 2.2.12: PopUp15 during site leveling and initial construction
Figure 2.2.13: Bikes del Pueblo workshop space aœer initial construction
Figure 2.2.14: Bikes del Pueblo banners advertising services at PopUp15
Figure 2.2.15: PopUp15 in January 2017 following initial construction
Figure 2.6.16: PopUp15 in May 2017 (Source: Steve Aldana)
Figure 2.6.17: PopUp15 in May 2017 (Source: Steve Aldana)
Figure 2.3.1: Framework Components and Values
Figure 2.3.2: Connections between emergence theory and Framework 
Figure 2.3.3: Construction during PopUP15
Figure 2.3.4: Canyon-Adjacent Lot in Encanto
Figure 2.3.5: Vacant Lot near Euclid Ave. and Market Street
Figure 2.3.6: À nous le parking  (Source: Collectif-Etc)
Figure 2.3.7: Repurposed Pallets (Source: Makers Quarter San Diego)
Figure 2.3.8: Pallet Basket Planters 
Figure 2.3.9: Concrete Pavers at Urban Outfitters HQ
Figure 2.3.10: Recycled Concrete Wall  (Source: gardendrum.com)
Figure 2.3.11: Saw-Cut Sidewalk Reuse  (Source: Rios Clementi Hale)
Figure 2.3.12: Concrete Pavers at Urban Outfitters HQ
Figure 2.3.13: Plywood Seating, Lentspace  (Source: Interboro Partners)
Figure 2.3.15: Planters and Seating at Lentspace (Interboro Partners)
Figure 2.3.16: Stage & Seating, Le Brasero (Source: BruitduFrigo.com)
Figure 2.3.17: Teatro del Mare Seating (Source: ConstructLab/exyzt)
Figure 2.3.18: 8x8x16 CMU Block  (Source: RCP Block and Brick)
Figure 2.3.19: Dry-Stacked CMU Wall (Source: ultimate-handyman.com)
Figure 2.3.20: Creative CMU Planter Wall (Source: Zack Benson)
Figure 2.3.21: CMU Steps  (Source: theFigure5.wordpress.com)
Figure 2.3.22: Gabion retaining wall
Figure 2.3.23: Bench cap on gabion seat wall
Figure 2.3.24: Decorative gabion wall
Figure 2.3.25: Temporary chain link fence
Figure 2.3.26: Chain Link Fence Materials  (Source: Mutual Industries)
Figure 2.3.27: Chain link trellis and partition (Source: Interboro Partners)
Figure 2.3.28: Decomposed Granite  (Source: Soils Plus)
Figure 2.3.29: DG at SILO Maker’s Quarter 
Figure 2.3.30: Decomposed Granite Ramp
Figure 2.3.31: Modular pavers at PopUp15
Figure 2.3.32: Modular concrete paver  (Source: Home Depot)
Figure 2.3.33: Modular concrete paver  (Source: Home Depot)
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Figure 2.3.34: Coarse pine wood chips
Figure 2.3.35: Wood chip Pathways
Figure 2.3.36: Wood chips 4” thick over asphalt pavement
Figure 2.3.37: Murals painted on asphalt  (Source: M.Fischetti)
Figure 2.3.38: Swap meet on asphalt  (Source: 1.bp.blogspot.com)
Figure 2.3.39: Asphalt at Quartyard San Diego
Figure 2.3.40: Crushed #3 Gravel (Source: Gernatt Asphalt Products)
Figure 2.3.41: 3/4” Gravel  (Source: RCP Block and Brick)
Figure 2.3.42: 3/4” Gravel Road Base  (Source: Rhodehouse Construction)
Figure 2.3.43: Concrete curb (Source: External Works)
Figure 2.3.44: Poured curb edger  (Source: ArchiExpo)
Figure 2.3.45: Concrete Edging  (Source: DIY Advice)
Figure 2.3.46: 4’ x 10” Diam. Footing Form (Source: Lowes)
Figure 2.3.47: Footing Form (Source: Lowes)
Figure 2.3.48: Footing and Bracket (Source: Quikrete)
Figure 2.3.49: Sca¥olding
Figure 2.3.50: Sca¥olding Fittings
Figure 2.3.51: Sca¥old shade and platform at the lido (Src: David Carr-Smith)
Figure 2.3.52: Angled aluminum walkway (Source: Discount Ramps)
Figure 2.3.53: Aluminum walkway (Source: Discount Ramps)
Figure 2.3.54: ADA-Compliant Alum. Ramp (Source: G&A Manufacturing)
Figure 2.3.55: Unmodified 40-foot container
Figure 2.3.56: Co¥ee shop container conversion - sliding door
Figure 2.3.57: Restaurant container conversion - hinged service window
Figure 2.3.58: Rebar arbor  (Source: Gardening From the Ground Up)
Figure 2.3.59: Rebar stake  (Source: ePlaya)
Figure 2.3.60: Welded wire and rebar trellis (Source: Shaun’s Backyard)
Figure 2.3.61: Keystone unit  (Source: RCP Block)
Figure 2.3.62: Keystone retaining wall  (Source: RCP Block)
Figure 2.3.63: Keystone wall detail  (Source: Davis Colors)
Figure 2.3.64: Keystone wall (Source: Firth)
Figure 2.3.65: Shade Sail over playground  (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Figure 2.3.66: Concrete tire supports for shade sails
Figure 2.3.67: Rectangular shade sail  (Source: Shade Industries)
Figure 2.3.68: Bag toss at Quartyard San Diego
Figure 2.3.69: Large games at the Oval in PHL (Source: M. Fischetti)
Figure 2.3.70: Sandbox at Brut du Frigo (Source: BruitduFrigo.com)
Figure 2.3.71: Giant Jenga at Quartyard San Diego
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Figure 2.3.72: Modular plastic play equipment (Source: Richard Dattner)
Figure 2.4.1: GUC Project Process Diagram
Figure 2.4.2: GUC Project Process Phase 1
Figure 2.4.3: GUC Project Process Phase 2
Figure 2.4.3: GUC Project Process Phase 3
Figure 2.5.1: City-owned vacant lot in the Valencia Park neighborhood of Encanto
Figure 2.5.2: Comparative Lot Table
Figure 2.5.3: Site Context - PopUp15
Figure 2.5.4: Site conditions - PopUp15
Figure 2.5.5: Historic aerial photos - PopUp15 (Source: Google Earth)
Figure 2.5.6: PopUp15 ‘Assemblage’ Collage
Figure 2.5.7: Site conditions photos - PopUp15
Figure 2.5.8: Site Context - Martin Avenue Park
Figure 2.5.9: Site conditions - Martin Avenue Park
Figure 2.5.10: Historic aerial photos - Martin Avenue Park (Source: Google Earth)
Figure 2.5.11: Martin Avenue Park ‘Assemblage’ Collage
Figure 2.5.12: Site conditions photos - Martin Avenue Park
Figure 2.5.13: Site Context - Market Street Hillside
Figure 2.5.14: Historic aerial photos - Market Street Hillside (Source: Google Earth)
Figure 2.5.15: Site conditions - Market Street Hillside
Figure 2.5.17: Site conditions photos - Market Street Hillside and properties across street
Figure 2.5.18: Market Street Hillside ‘Assemblage’ Collage
Figure 2.6.1: National Avenue in Southcrest near Martin Avenue Park
Figure 2.6.2: Boulevard Trasit Plaza at I-15
Figure 2.6.3: Bikeway in City Heights near PopUp15
Figure 2.6.4: PopUp15 Spatial Sca¥old
Figure 2.6.5: PopUp15 Potential Design Scenarios and Program Area Key
Figure 2.6.6: PopUp15 Landscape Program Area Key Plan
Figure 2.6.7: PopUp15 Spatial Sca¥old Rendering
Figure 2.6.8: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.9: PopUp15 Scenario 1 Rendering
Figure 2.6.10: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.11: PopUp15 Scenario 2 Rendering
Figure 2.6.12: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.13: PopUp15 Scenario 3 Rendering
Figure 2.6.14: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.15: Ocean View Boulevard near Martin Ave. Park
Figure 2.6.16: Chollas Creek - Degraded urban drainageway
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Figure 2.6.17: Martin Avenue Park Spatial Sca¥old
Figure 2.6.18: Martin Avenue Park Potential Design Scenarios and Program Area Key
Figure 2.6.19: Martin Avenue Park Landscape Program Area Key Plan
Figure 2.6.20: Martin Avenue Park Spatial Sca¥old Rendering
Figure 2.6.21: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.22: Martin Avenue Park Scenario 1 Rendering
Figure 2.6.23: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.24: Martin Avenue Park Scenario 2 Rendering
Figure 2.6.25: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.26: Martin Avenue Park Scenario 3 Rendering
Figure 2.6.27: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.28: Market St. at 47th St. near Hillside Site 
Figure 2.6.29: Market Creek Plaza (front) and Jacobs Center (rear)
Figure 2.6.30: Market Hillside Spatial Sca¥old
Figure 2.6.31: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.32: Market Street Hillside Spatial Sca¥old
Figure 2.6.33: Market Hillside Potential Design Scenarios and Program Area Key
Figure 2.6.34: Market Hillside Scenario 1 Rendering
Figure 2.6.35: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.36: Market Hillside Landscape Program Area Key Plan
Figure 2.6.37: Market Hillside Scenario 2 Rendering Figure 2.6.38: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.38: Market Hillside Scenario 3 Rendering
Figure 2.6.39: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 3.1: Vacant lot at I-15 and University Ave 
Figure 3.2: City-owned vacant lot in Southcrest
Figure 3.3: Connections between proposed Framework outcomes and emergence theory
Figure 3.4: Z-Street Pocket Park - Currently undeveloped City Parks-owned property in Southcrest
Figure 3.5: Parklet in the Sunset District of San Francisco
Figure 4.1: CAS in Urbanism Diagram (Source: Sharon Wohl and Sean Wittmeyer)
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KEY TERMS
“...the movement from low-level rules to higher-level sophistication” (Johnson, 
2001)
“...urban ecosystems of diverse ownership that depend on collective 
management and organization,” usually by groups of strangers with diverse 
backgrounds and desires” (Colding and Barthel, 2013)
A practice concerned with how “the morphologic characteristics of the city 
help enable it to evolve, incrementally, over time” where “time and evolution” 
are considered “key to generating fit urban spaces” (Wohl and Wittmeyer, n.d.)
“1) the amount of disturbance that a system can absorb while still remaining 
within the same state or domain of attraction; 2) the degree to which the system 
is capable of self-organization (versus lack of organization or organization 
forced by external factors); and 3) the degree to which a system can build and 
increase its capacity for learning and adaptation” (Cumming, 2011 as cited in 
Desouza and Flanery, 2013)
The ability of an urban system to “absorb, adapt, and respond to changes“ 
(Desouza and Flanery, 2013)
“An individual’s perception of his/her position in the context of culture and 
value systems in which they live in and in relation to their goals, expectations, 
standards and concerns. It is a broad-ranging concept incorporating, in 
a complex way, the person’s physical health, psychological state, level of 
independence, social relationships, personal beliefs and relationships to 
salient features of the environment” (WHOQOL Group, 1998)
“...an attempt to understand the dynamics of complex systems where the 
behavior of the system depends upon unpredictable interactions between 
parts” (Dovey, 2012).
Low-risk changes to the built environment that present an alternative to large 
scale, high investment change. These projects are oœen incremental and 
subject to ongoing evaluation, revision, and adaptation (Lister, 2016; Ahern, 
2011)
Emergence
Green Urban Commons (GUC)
Iterative Urbanism
Resilience
Quality of Life
Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) 
Theory
Safe-to-fail
Urban Resilience

1Emergence can be defined as “the movement from low-level rules to higher-
level sophistication” (Johnson, 2001). Anthills, beehives, bird flocks, and even 
human social systems can be understood as emergent phenomena; these 
complex systems seem to materialize out of the apparently chaotic interaction 
of their simpler parts. Emergence helps to explain how systems develop and 
change, and there is a growing body of literature where emergence theory 
is used to explain urban environments as Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS). 
A challenge remains, however, to translate our understanding of emergence 
and CAS into operative guidelines for the design of sustainable urban 
environments.
Several landscape architectural theories including Landscape Urbanism, 
Ecological Urbanism, and the writing of Rod Barnett have endeavored to 
reconcile our understanding of CAS with the act of designing urban landscapes. 
This project builds upon this discourse by applying Barnett’s description of 
emergence theory to the design of specific landscape phenomena called green 
urban commons (GUC). The development and use of GUCs already closely 
align with Barnett’s description of civic landscapes that exhibit emergent 
characteristics. GUCs are understood as “urban ecosystems of diverse 
ownership that depend on collective management and organization,” usually 
by groups of strangers with diverse backgrounds and desires (Colding and 
Barthel, 2013). Examples include community gardens, urban tree orchards, 
plazas, and other public spaces such as Times Square. These niche landscape 
phenomena loosen existing structures and allow novel forms of land use 
to materialize (Radywyl and Biggs, 2013). Related to the nascent practice of 
iterative urbanism, GUCs take various forms and oœen involve the conversion 
of underutilized urban land into productive community assets. These 
landscapes are iterated and changed over time by groups of stakeholders, 
and temporary land uses oœen transition to more fixed, institutionalized 
change. As negotiated urban spaces, GUCs are recognized as contributors to 
both community political capacity and urban resilience (Colding et al., 2013; 
Colding and Barthel, 2013; Radywl and Biggs, 2013).
The goal of this project is to encourage the creation of GUCs in San Diego’s 
Mid-City and Southeastern communities as a means to improve resident 
quality of life and urban resilience. The explicit application of emergence 
theory is presented as a way to enhance the landscape quality of GUCs, 
and a framework is proposed to encourage and expedite the development 
INTRODUCTION
Figure 1.2: New Roots Community Garden
Figure 1.1: Vacant Lot, Southeast San Diego
2of new GUCs on city-owned vacant land in San Diego. 
To assess the scalability of this project’s prescriptive 
recommendations, portions of the Framework process 
are applied to three vacant urban lots in the Mid-City/
Southeastern San Diego study area. These case studies 
are then discussed in light of Barnett’s criteria for civic 
landscapes that exhibit emergent characteristics.
This chapter contains a brief discussion of project 
significance and the key theoretical concepts that have 
guided project research. Theories and precedent-based 
assertions are discussed to provide a foundation for the 
researcher’s design decisions during action research, 
Framework development, and site-specific landscape 
proposals. 
Project Significance
The creation of new GUCs on underutilized urban land 
can benefit communities facing an array of economic, 
social, and environmental justice challenges.  Since 
volunteer or community-led e¥orts for GUC creation 
can be understood as informal and process-oriented, 
this project proposes a framework for designing and 
managing these spaces that is flexible and open-ended.
In their article “Rethinking urban transformation: 
Temporary uses for vacant land,” Jeremy Nemeth and 
Joern Langhorst (2014) present the case for “temporary, 
incremental, flexible, and experimental responses to 
urban vacant land,” arguing for a “systematic inclusion 
of temporary uses into existing planning and design 
instruments to realize the latent potentials of vacant 
urban lands as an important resource.” Such temporary 
uses oœen entail the appropriation of vacant land for 
some new ecological, social, economic, or public space 
function. A classic example might be the use of vacant 
land for urban agriculture, though more contemporary 
interventions have endeavored to develop new parks and 
public spaces on previously derelict lots (Bishop, 2012; 
Fernández and Mozas, 2012). Temporary use of vacant 
urban land is understood as a reflexive, open-ended 
solution in response to urban systems that are constantly 
in flux. Several “shrinking cities” in the United States such 
as Detroit and New Orleans have been the subject of 
speculative design projects focused on temporary uses 
for vacant urban lots, though Nemeth and Langhorst 
present the argument that an economically robust city 
such as San Diego could also benefit from an exploration 
of design possibilities for its publicly-owned vacant land. 
Temporary uses for vacant land may also be classed as 
iterative urbanism projects, where interventions initially 
considered ‘temporary’ actually change and inform 
the future of an urban landscape, neighborhood, or 
community (Westbury, 2012; Wohl and Wittmeyer, n.d.). 
Such projects oœen embody a participatory, ‘bottom-
up’ approach to the design of urban spaces that allow 
community members and laypeople to take an active 
role in the design of their urban spaces. These instances 
of direct engagement in the development of urban 
landscapes oœen strengthen communities’ political 
capacity by encouraging residents to claim agency over 
their physical surroundings and democratically negotiate 
the trajectory of their built environment.
Despite the fact that vacant land use and iterative 
urbanism projects are becoming accepted in the 
mainstream of urban planning, few designers have taken 
on the challenge of proposing a scalable, emergent 
framework for GUCs rooted in the principles of CAS. 
Urban master plans and large public park designs by the 
studios of George Hargreaves, James Corner, and Michel 
Desvigne have endeavored toward nonlinear, emergentist 
designs rooted in CAS theory, though no explicit e¥ort has 
been made to construe the theoretical underpinnings of 
these propositions to small-scale community-driven 
vacant land development (Berrizbeitia, 2007; Czerniak 
and Hargreaves, 2007; Tiberghien, 2012).
Informed by action research, this project proposes a 
flexible, process-oriented Framework and pragmatic “kit-
of parts” for GUC development, equipping stakeholder 
groups with design guidelines and organizational 
strategies that can facilitate the improvement of unsafe, 
underutilized vacant lands. By providing a low-cost 
palette of materials and “Spatial Sca¥old” to guide 
physical development, this project lowers barriers to the 
creation and collective management of new public spaces 
in some of San Diego’s most underserved communities. 
By revealing the untapped potential of vacant lots, it is 
hoped that this project will inspire residents in these 
areas to take an active role in the development of public 
space in their own neighborhoods.
3LANDSCAPE TYPE
In order to comprehend the impact of this project, 
one must also understand the landscape type being 
designed. Specifically, the landscapes proposed by the 
Framework are GUCs on vacant city-owned land that 
qualify as iterative urbanism projects.
Urban Design
This research project ties into a broader discussion about 
what constitutes good urban design. Sentiments and 
theories as to how cities and public spaces should be built 
have changed throughout history, and an abundance of 
literature exists on the topic. A cursory summary of the 
western approach to urban design suggests movement 
from the organic development patterns of ancient and 
medieval cities to baroque and Renaissance urban design 
approaches characterized by axial geometry, symmetry, 
order, and a direct aesthetic connection to the high 
classicism of the ancient Greeks. As the scientific, rational 
approach of the Renaissance and Enlightenment periods 
led toward modernity and the industrial revolution of the 
19th century, cities seethed and grew along with the rise 
in manufacturing and concentrated centers of work. As an 
answer to the social ills of industrialization and what he 
saw as irresponsible, lifeless urban design, Camillo Sitte 
published City Planning According to Artistic Principles 
in 1889 to expound the importance of aesthetics in the 
design of cities. Sitte, along with his contemporaries 
such as Werner Hengemann, conducted extensive urban 
precedent research on European spaces such as Piazza 
Duomo (Figure 1.3) to inform their practice of “civic art,” 
craœing picturesque places to provide healthy, beautiful 
living environments for city dwellers (Bohl, 2009). Urban 
design was translated to an American context by Figures 
such as John Nolen, who developed comprehensive 
plans for more than twenty-five cities in the United 
States (Stephenson, 2014). Nolen’s general plans, such 
as the one for Venice Florida (Figure 1.4) guided the 
development of urban form by designing large-scale 
networks of green open spaces, roads, and civic centers.
The aesthetic emphasis of Hengemann and Sitte 
contrasts sharply with Nolen’s function-based approach 
to urban design that gained popularity in post-war 
20th century America. Along with dramatic advances in 
technology and manufacturing, urban form was dictated 
largely by municipal zoning that eschewed walkable 
mixed-use communities and instead favored suburban 
development and automobile infrastructure. The work 
1960s and 1970s of Figures such as Jane Jacobs, William 
Whyte, and Christopher Alexander ushered in critiques 
of the ‘functional city’ and spurred the new urbanism 
approach to urban design that advocates for mixed-use, 
human-scale urban environments.
Figure 1.3: Piazza Duomo, Milan, Italy (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
4Figure 1.5: E’lorescent Ecologies Master Plan, Zhenhai, China (Source: Maya Abdul-Latif)
Figure 1.4: John Nolen plan for Venice, Florida (Source: City of Venice)
5Vacant Land Use
The very notion of “vacant land” is contentious. While 
some might see vacant land as blight or hazard, still 
others might see it as a playground, wildlife habitat, or 
tabula rasa awaiting commercial development. These 
perceptions and attitudes toward vacant lots vary 
between individuals and communities, evolving from the 
complex interplay of social and economic forces (Foo et 
al., 2013). Although the presence of some vacant land is 
understood as the consequence of contemporary urban 
settlement patterns, vacant parcels in many shrinking 
cities and low-income communities pose a challenge to 
urban revitalization and community health (Pearsall and 
Lucas, 2014). Furthermore, the presence of vacant land 
and derelict property has been correlated to higher levels 
of crime, adolescent drug use, increased risk of fire injury, 
and can be understood as a type of urban “physical 
disorder” linked to an array of poor health outcomes 
including cardiovascular disease and mental illness 
(Garvin et al., 2012).
A growing body of literature suggests that the interim 
appropriation of vacant land is a means to alleviate the 
negative outcomes of urban vacancy. The addition of 
ecological function within vacant lots is cited as a low-
cost means to increase urban ecosystem services such as 
stormwater treatment and wildlife habitat (Burkholder, 
2012). Projects on vacant land such as community 
gardens, although oœen considered temporary or interim 
uses, provide communities with nutrition and challenge 
negative perceptions in areas that have been historically 
burdened by blight or neglect (Armstrong, 2000; Lawson, 
2004; Schmelzkopf, 1995). Furthermore, the addition 
of new social or ecological function within vacant lots, 
paired with public access and collective stewardship, 
has been shown foster “cues to care” within urban 
communities and improve residents’ perceptions of their 
neighborhoods (Foo et al., 2013; Nassauer, 1995).
The City of San Diego, California has over 4200 tax lot 
parcels listed as “Vacant or Undeveloped,” totaling in 
at over 31.4 square miles.  322 of these vacant lots are 
City-owned, constituting 7.6% of the total number of lots 
with a landmass of 467.44 acres (SanGIS, 2016). Beyond 
a mowing and vegetation management regime on some 
lots, little is being done to leverage the latent potential of 
these public properties. 
In our current era characterized by globalization, many 
contemporary landscape architects and urban design 
theorists have begun to favor landscape urbanism and 
ecological urbanism as ways to explain and shape the 
environment. Landscape urbanism contrasts sharply with 
the picturesque means of Sitte, Nolen’s comprehensive 
urban planning, and post-war modernism. Aœer Charles 
Waldheim, Rod Barnett summarizes the components of 
landscape urbanism as follows:
1. Basis in postmodern critique of architectural 
urbanism
2. Recognition of the indierence of city development 
to the stylistic oscillations of architecture
3. Landscape as a singular medium in its own right
4. Development of landscape architectural practice 
in the wake of modern urban decay (brownfields 
and industrial sites)
5. The demise of physical design in the discipline of 
planning
6. Integration of infrastructure and public space 
design
7. Assumption of the operational methodologies of 
field ecology
8. Rise of the event/program for public urban 
terrain (and identification of programmatic 
indeterminacy)
9. Replacement of plan by strategy
10. Orchestration of diverse contents and elements
11. Introduction of phasing
12. Equivalence of urban systems and natural systems
(Waldheim 2002, 2006a, 2006b, 2007 as cited in Barnett, 
2013). Barnett goes on to argue that the latter six 
characteristics possess a direct connection to emergence, 
stating “the most obvious place to look for emergence 
in contemporary public space design is in the design 
practices and writings of landscape architects who 
align themselves with landscape urbanism” (Barnett, 
2013). Several aspects apply directly to this project and 
the development of GUCs, such as the “replacement of 
plan by strategy,” the “indi¥erence of city development 
to the stylistic oscillations of architecture,” and the 
“development of landscape architectural practice in the 
wake of modern urban decay.” The former is particularly 
applicable, as many GUCs occur within spaces that are 
otherwise overlooked, derelict, or outside the bounds of 
institutional oversight.
6Iterative Urbanism
In an e¥ort to alleviate the negative impact of vacant 
land, community activists and civic o¥icials across the 
globe have begun to respond with “tactical urbanism” 
landscape interventions that quickly, inexpensively 
improve vacant lots and generate new public space 
(Bishop and Williams, 2012; Lydon and Garcia, 2015). 
These projects are oœen framed as rapid, inexpensive, 
and scalable responses to deficiencies in the urban 
built environment (Lydon and Garcia, 2015) and have in 
some cases been ascribed the more appropriate title of 
“iterative urbanism” projects (Westbury, 2012). Although 
tactical or iterative urbanism projects take a myriad of 
forms, the phenomena oœen emerges “in response to the 
inability of urban design and development to deal with 
social, economic, and ecological crisis” (Tardiveau and 
Mallo, 2014). In their book Tactical Urbanism, Mike Lydon 
and Anthony Garcia classify three common applications 
for such interventions: 1) citizen-initiated e¥orts that 
bypass formal bureaucracy and allow citizens to assert 
their “right to the city” by prototyping, protesting, or 
revealing the unseen potential of marginal urban land; 
2) government, developer, or organization-led e¥orts 
to “engage the public during planning, delivery, and 
development processes;” and 3) as an early-stage 
prototype used by cities or developers prior to long-term 
investment (2015).
Iterative urbanism projects exist along a temporal 
land use continuum. In their book Temporary Urban 
Spaces, Florian Haydn and Robert Temel present several 
definitions key to the language of this project. The authors 
frame “temporary uses” as those that are planned at their 
outset to be impermanent. Furthermore, they present the 
notion of “temporary in the city” as a concept between 
“provisional” and “ephemeral,” whereby something that 
is temporary in the city is “short-lived like ephemeral, but 
unlike the latter it can certainly exist for a longer period 
than was initially intended… it is possible to extend its 
life.” Temporary urban landscapes also share “qualities 
with the provisional, but the temporary also has its 
own qualities and should not be viewed as merely a 
substitute for the fully adequate” (2006). Iterative urban 
design projects, on the other hand, remain cognizant of 
the fact that interventions that might begin as temporary 
have the potential to influence more permanent changes 
to the urban environment. 
A classic example of iterative urbanism is the 
development of the Times Square Pedestrian Plaza 
in New York City. A prominent international tourist 
destination, Times Square was characterized by heavy 
tra¥ic and auto-centric design despite its draw for 
pedestrian visitors. On what was initially a temporary 
basis, folding lawn chairs and tra¥ic barrels were used 
to test the closure of Times Square to auto tra¥ic and 
designate the space as a pedestrian-only zone (Figure 
1.6). The resulting space became so popular that there 
was su¥icient social momentum and political support 
for more permanent changes to be commissioned. As 
shown in Figures 1.7 and 1.8, a more formal pedestrian 
plaza designed by the firm Snøhetta replaced a second 
temporary iteration of paint, bollards, and moveable 
furniture. The initial deployment of temporary materials 
provided a low-risk and low-cost alternative to the more 
traditional mode of urban development that might have 
entailed comprehensive master planning and more 
permanent, ‘fixed’ initial design propositions (Lydon and 
Garcia, 2015). A more dramatic initial proposal for change 
might have been a non-starter, whereas the iterative 
project process and use of temporary materials allowed 
for the “loosening” of existing structures su¥icient for a 
new form of land use to materialize.  Furthermore, the 
iterative aspect of the Times Square project led to the 
mobilization of a stakeholder group that oversees the 
management and development of the space, and the 
Fig 1.6: Initial Times Square pedestrian zone (Source: NBC New York)
7plaza has been characterized as an example of a GUC 
(Radywyl and Biggs, 2013).
Sharon Wohl and Sean Wittmeyer consider iterative 
urban design as a practice concerned with how “the 
morphologic characteristics of the city help enable it 
to evolve, incrementally, over time” where “time and 
evolution” are considered “key to generating fit urban 
spaces” (n.d.). Furthermore, Nina-Marie Lister presents 
the case that “community experiments in design, and 
growth in rapid prototyping for small-scale projects” 
present “more agile responses to changing conditions” 
that constitute “safe-to fail” rather than “fail-safe” 
solutions to contemporary urban design problems 
(2016). 
Risks
Although much can be said in favor of iterative urbanism 
projects within vacant lots, the activity is not without 
pitfalls. It should be noted that “pop-up” public space 
interventions on vacant urban land are oœen used as 
catalysts for future construction, thereby increasing the 
risk of gentrification and the displacement of existing 
communities (Harris, 2015b). The geographer Ella Harris 
forewarns that pop-up landscape interventions and 
iterative urbanisms like it possess a “taciturn ambiguity” 
that “enables both precarious urban conditions and 
strategies of gentrification to be subsumed by a label 
that positions all temporariness as positive.” She also 
describes pop-up park environments as possessing the 
spatiotemporal “imaginary” of immersion, described 
as “the sensation of entering a space that immediately 
identifies itself as somehow separate from the 
world” (2015a, Gri¥iths, 2013). Harris argues that this 
characteristic of immersion can both help and harm as 
temporary land use interventions “transform perceptions 
of the sites they pop up in.” Taking multiple critiques of 
temporary land use into consideration, she argues that 
although temporary land use can “transform sites into a 
space of play for those with high disposable incomes at 
the expense of alienating or displacing the populations of 
the areas they occupy,” they can also conversely “add or 
uncover meanings in ways that are attentive to political 
and social dimensions of space, bringing the usually 
hidden layers of the city-as palimpsest into focus,” as well 
as “enable attentiveness to the particularities of place, 
foster community, and engage with environmental and 
political issues” (2013a). Figure 1.8: Formal Pedestrian plaza by Snøhetta  (Source: adsttc.com)
Fig 1.7: Temporary plaza at Times Square (Source: RSVLTS.com)
8Green Urban Commons (GUC)
GUCs are defined as “urban ecosystems of diverse 
ownership that depend on collective management and 
organization, ”usually by groups of strangers with diverse 
backgrounds and desires” (Colding and Barthel, 2013). 
An additional definition used by Colding et al., describes 
GUCs as “physical green spaces in urban settings of 
diverse ownership that depend on collective organization 
and management and to which individuals and interest 
groups participating in management hold a rich set of 
bundles of rights, including the rights to craœ their own 
institutions and to decide whom they want to include in 
their management schemes” (2013).
Occurring in such diverse settings as “parks, community 
gardens, building exteriors, vacant lots, and public 
housing campuses,” GUCs are understood to contribute 
to “sustainable urban transformation” and help 
humankind transition to more resilient cities (Colding 
et al., 2013; Radywl and Biggs, 2013). An example of 
GUCs oœen cited is that of community gardens and 
urban orchards. In addition to the positive public 
health outcomes and urban blight alleviation described 
earlier, these spaces provide a forum for end-users of 
landscapes to take a more active role in the negotiation 
of value-based landscape change (Radywyl and Biggs, 
2013). This aspect of democratic, collaborative decision-
making is a key aspect of many GUCs, and this project 
seeks to encourage such action as a means toward 
community empowerment and the strengthening of 
local political capacity. In this regard, new GUCs created 
using this project’s Framework stand to make a more 
significant impact than temporary vacant land activation 
or “pop-up” urbanism. While principles such as collective 
management and investment in GUCs have the potential 
to build political power, the physical development of 
Figure 1.9: New Roots Community Garden, San Diego (Source: JMS Reports)
9GUCs has also been shown to have a quantitatively 
positive impact on urban biodiversity and the generation 
of ecosystem services (Dennis and James, 2016). 
Furthermore, access to green space and participation 
in horticultural activities has a positive impact human 
health and wellbeing (Coutts, 2010, 2011; Hynes and 
Howe, 2004 as cited in Dennis and James, 2016). Each 
of these aspects has the potential to contribute to 
improvements in resident quality of life and urban 
resilience (in both a political and ecological regard).
User-Generated Urbanism
The term “user-generated urbanism” is closely tied to 
the notions of GUC, tactical urbanism, and “iterative 
placemaking,” as it entails the “bottom-up” participation 
of citizens in the negotiation and development of 
public spaces (Bela, 2015).  Regardless of application, 
user-driven urbanism projects are oœen framed as a 
direct engagement in the politics of urban space as a 
means toward community empowerment, whereby the 
“users” have the potential to claim greater agency over 
the environment in which they live (Andres, 2013; Bela, 
2015; Iveson, 2013). This potential for political capacity 
building is especially pertinent to long-marginalized 
communities like Mid-City and Southeastern San Diego. 
In addition to providing physical access to public green 
space, the process of creating and managing GUCs 
empowers communities to assert their “right to the city” 
and participate in the social construction of the urban 
environment (Bela, 2014; Lefebvre, 1991; Tardiveau and 
Mallo, 2014). The international phenomena of PARK(ing) 
day is oœen held up as an example of city-dwellers’ 
assertion of their “right to the city” and participation 
in user-generated urbanism. For one day each year, 
PARK(ing) day events encourage everyday citizens to 
construct temporary ‘parks’ within sidewalk-adjacent 
auto parking spaces. With designs ranging from the 
placement of turf and a bench upon asphalt to the 
establishment of temporary reading libraries and ping 
pong arenas, PARK(ing) day is intended to remind city 
inhabitants that the streets, although oœen dominated 
by automobiles, are part of the realm of publicly-
owned space. In the spirit of iterative urbanism, some 
interventions that began as temporary PARK(ing) 
day designs have since become formalized as more 
permanent ‘Parklet’ public spaces that possess many of 
the characteristics of GUCs.
The emergentist GUC propositions in this project are 
directly correlated to the notion of user-driven urbanism 
because of they encourage “assumption of local control 
over local conditions,” recognizing that “people’s ability 
to make small changes to their environmental conditions 
can spiral upwards into dramatic revisions of social 
relationships” (Barnett, 2013). 
Value Negotiation and Political Capacity
Iterative urbanism e¥orts that are user-driven, such as 
the GUC proposal of this project, are understood as more 
resistant to the negative outcomes of development and 
urban revitalization because participatory development 
and collaborative management build the political 
capacity of end-users (Andres, 2013). Direct community 
action and outcome-based approaches to urban design 
such as iterative GUC development can guide urban 
regeneration toward what individual communities 
desire for their living environments rather than leaving 
development to the whim of developers or other external 
forces.
Urban Resilience
As a concept, resilience can be defined as consisting 
of: “1) the amount of disturbance that a system can 
absorb while still remaining within the same state or 
domain of attraction; 2) the degree to which the system is 
capable of self-organization (versus lack of organization 
or organization forced by external factors); and 3) the 
degree to which a system can build and increase its 
capacity for learning and adaptation” (Cumming, 2011 
as cited in Desouza and Flanery, 2013). Strategies for 
resilient cities include “assume change and uncertainty, 
nurture conditions for recovery and renewal aœer 
disturbance, combine di¥erent types of knowledge for 
learning” and “create opportunities for self-organization” 
(Wilkinson, 2011 as cited in Desouza and Flanery, 2013). 
The nascent practice of “safe-to-fail” iterative urbanism 
projects has been directly correlated to notions of urban 
resilience (Ahern, 2011; Lister, 2016). By responding to 
disruptions in the socioeconomic or ecological fabric 
of the city, iterative urbanism projects such as GUCs 
oœen leverage limited resources for public benefit. 
In addition to providing spatially explicit landscape 
functions, negotiated spaces like GUC interventions 
are also recognized as contributors to the resilience of 
urban systems because they loosen existing institutional 
10
structures and provide opportunities for community 
empowerment (Radywl and Biggs, 2013).
In addition to being correlated to the large-scale 
evolution of urban systems, the notion of resilience may 
also be applied to the scale of an individual landscape 
site. A shorthand definition of resilient landscapes can be 
characterized as “those that adapt to volatile conditions 
while maintaining functional integrity” (Woodward, 2008). 
In landscape architecture, aesthetics have also been 
invoked as a means to maintain functional integrity and 
project longevity (Meyer, 2008). Intentionally designed 
“cues to care” encourage collective stewardship, while 
beauty has been compellingly argued as a key aspect of 
sustainable landscape design (Nassauer, 1999). To this 
end, aesthetics remain a key design consideration in this 
project’s proposed e¥orts to intervene in and sustain 
GUCs.
Resident Quality of Life
Quality of life is itself a di¥icult concept to define or 
quantify, consisting of both objective and subjective 
measures related to socioeconomics, individual and 
community well-being, housing satisfaction, livability, 
and urban living conditions (Mohit, 2013), The concept 
can be generally defined as “an individual’s perception 
of his/her position in the context of culture and value 
systems in which they live in and in relation to their 
goals, expectations, standards and concerns. It is a 
broad-ranging concept incorporating, in a complex way, 
the person’s physical health, psychological state, level 
of independence, social relationships, personal beliefs 
and relationships to salient features of the environment” 
(WHOQOL Group, 1998). Many of the positive ecological, 
public health, and resident perception outcomes related 
to iterative vacant land interventions can be correlated 
to an improvement of quality of life in the communities in 
which they occur.
EMERGENCE THEORY
Built upon discourse related to Landscape Urbanism and 
the application of CAS theory to landscape architectural 
practice, Rod Barnett’s interpretation of emergence 
theory drives the Framework development and design 
process in this project. In e¥ect, the GUC Framework 
in this project aspires to encourage patterns of self-
organization in civic spaces that are similar to other 
Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS).
Conjured as a response to scientific reductionism, 
“emergence theory attempts to describe how things 
and the interactive systems that comprise all things 
can change and develop” (Barnett, 2013). Framed 
as a response to scientific reductionism, emergence 
theory does not assume a deductive or linear 
progression of social or metaphysical phenomena. 
Instead, the movement from low-level rules to higher-
level sophistication is characterized by nonlinearity, 
dynamism, adaptation, and unintended consequences 
(Murphy 2007). Furthermore, emergence theory 
“foregrounds the idea, prevalent in contemporary 
materialist philosophy, actor-network theory, systems 
ecology and other disciplines, that everything that exists 
always becomes and never is” (Barnett, 2013).
Nonlinear Urban Development
Urban environments and cities are understood as 
shiœing, complex, self-organizing systems (Spirn, 2012; 
Mostafavi and Gareth, 2010). A successful framework 
for GUC interventions must operate within this context 
of material flows, resource flows, and socioeconomic 
complexity
Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS)
In tandem with Rod Barnett’s more contemporary 
writings on emergence, CAS theory has made a 
significant impact upon contemporary landscape 
architectural discourse and practice. CAS theory is 
“an attempt to understand the dynamics of complex 
systems where the behavior of the system depends 
upon unpredictable interactions between parts” (Dovey, 
2012). The adoption of CAS theory as both an operative 
and explanatory framework for landscape design has led 
to revelations about how process-oriented landscape 
designs might achieve a desirable balance between 
rigid structure and the self-organization associated 
with ecological principles of resilience and succession 
(Stilgenbauer, 2015). Anita Berrizbeitia argues that CAS 
theory can be used by designers to propose a beneficial 
level of “undecidability” that allows landscapes to take 
on an open-ended, process-oriented, and propositional 
character; conceptualizing landscape designs that 
are “precisely open rather than vaguely loose” (2001). 
Her description of CAS theory is essentially “the study 
11
of the abstract organization of phenomena and the 
interaction of this organization with its environment” 
(2001). According to a CAS theory interpretation, 
landscape architectural interventions can be understood 
as a complex assemblage of interactive parts that have 
the potential for a myriad of future trajectories. For an 
illustration of additional connections between CAS 
and contemporary urban design theories, please see 
Appendix A.
Assemblage
Assemblage can be defined as “objects, bodies, 
expressions, qualities, and territories that come together 
for varying periods of time, ideally to create new ways 
of functioning” (Deleuze and Guattari, 1987). They are 
wholes “formed from the interconnectivity and flows 
between constituent parts,” and all landscapes, whether 
at the scale of a street, city block, or metropolitan area, 
can be considered as assemblages (Dovey, 2012). The 
notion of assemblage has been directly related to CAS 
theory (Dovey, 2012) as well as emergence (Barnett, 
2014) and iterative urbanism designs (Wohl and 
Wittmeyer, n.d.) and is oœen used to explain the complex 
and sometimes unpredictable interactions between 
perception, material, and space. The classification or 
description of assemblage, however, is particularly 
problematic because they are “at once material and 
representation and [defy] any reduction to essence, to 
textual analysis or to materiality” (Dovey, 2012).
Kim Dovey (2012) posits, “Assemblage is a useful way of 
re-thinking theories of ‘place’ in terms of process, identity 
formation, and becoming.” Similarities can drawn 
between the characteristics of assemblage and iterative 
landscapes because they are heterogeneous, dynamic 
systems where materials and meaning exist in relation to 
time and stability (Tardiveau and Mallo, 2014). The notion 
of assemblage, particularly its relational explanation of 
landscapes and attachment to the idea that all things are 
always “becoming,” integrates with aspects of emergence 
theory. A successful emergentist civic landscape is 
one that explicitly accommodates the shiœing of both 
physical form and social meaning over time, similar to 
the ways that an assemblage undergoes constant change 
(Barnett, 2013).
Emergence and Landscape Architecture
In his book Emergence in Landscape Architecture, Rod 
Barnett has conveyed a conceptual approach that can 
bridge an emergence theory-based practice of landscape 
design with the GUC landscape type. He frames 
emergence theory as a way of explaining landscapes and 
provides some guidelines for design practice.
LOW-LEVEL ELEMENTS
EMERGENT 
STRUCTURES
GIVE RISE TO
INFLUENCE INFLUENCE
(AFTER ROUTLEDGE, N.D.)
Figure 1.10: Emergence Diagram (Source: Routledge)
12
The Designer’s Role
Because emergence theory builds upon CAS theory, 
the designer must recognize landscape interventions 
as contingent modifications to the environment that 
are hitched to, driven by, and existing within a social 
and environmental context. Rather than promoting 
fixed, deterministic designs that assume a single 
trajectory of contextual conditions, Barnett argues for 
public space designs that embody a self-awareness of 
change over time and of intimate, dynamic interactions 
with contextual forces. These open-ended design 
compositions assume, and spatially account for, the 
development of alternative futures and narratives that 
emerge through the interaction of social, ecological, 
political, and economic systems (Barnett, 2013). Such an 
approach can assure a project’s “survival as a socially-
relevant place, its programs in an endless process of 
self-renewal, as new cultural practices and subjectivities 
emerge” (Berrizbeitia 2001). In an emergent landscape 
architectural practice, it is recognized that all things are 
constantly “becoming” and subject to the continued 
evolution of both physical and social states. The 
designer’s role, therefore, is to set initial conditions for 
the ongoing social and physical evolution of a landscape. 
An initial physical sca¥old is proposed and constructed, 
from which social meaning and material conditions are 
intentionally leœ to evolve and emerge.
Civic Design
In Emergence in Landscape Architecture, Rod Barnett 
describes six “hallmarks” of emergent public space 
design: 1) a “multitude of connections between 
environmental design and social outcome. …this 
connectivity will be such that the emergent social 
phenomena would have an autonomous existence, and 
yet depend on the designed structures to enable and 
support them”; 2) “commitment to strong emergence,” 
or in other words, “higher-level functioning in some way 
influences lower-level functioning”; 3) “the appearance 
of novel social properties”; 4) “assumption of local 
control over local conditions”; 5) “at least three types 
of simultaneously applicable explanation [(bottom-up, 
same-level, and top-down)] possible for [the] designed 
landscape”; and 6) a recognition that “urban landscapes 
are at once social systems and ecosystems,” and “the 
landscape architect is responsible for a description of 
that situation” (2013). 
These six hallmarks are explicitly applied to the 
development of the Framework in this document and are 
summarized as bullet points in Figure 1.13. Appendix B 
includes additional excerpts from Barnett (2013) detailing 
what the researcher perceived as design guidelines 
for each of the hallmarks. By providing a desired set of 
end conditions in the form of his six hallmarks, Barnett 
has provided the foundation for a GUC development 
Framework. The Framework proposed in this document 
strives to meet Barnett’s hallmarks through an 
outcome-based approach, where specific aspects of the 
Framework are correlated directly to achieving Barnett’s 
desired emergent landscape criteria.
RESEARCH THROUGH 
DESIGNING
Emergence theory, combined with an understanding 
of iterative urbanism, negotiates the designer’s role in 
the creation of temporary GUCs. Action research, the 
designed Framework, and subsequent site-specific 
proposals for GUC development in San Diego’s Mid-City 
and Southeastern communities are a context-specific 
synthesis of these theoretical concepts. A detailed 
account of this synthesis begins in the next chapter with 
a description of design context. 
Knowledge Claim
This project leverages a “pragmatic research through 
designing” approach to critically explore the potential of 
an emergence theory-driven Framework for GUC design 
(Lenzholzer et al., 2013). Design process allows for a 
reflexive generation of knowledge because “theoretical 
understanding emerges as research is underway,” where 
“insight emerges inductively from the design setting… 
and deductively from the testing and challenging of 
established concepts” (Deming and Swa¥ield, 2011). The 
GUC Framework in this project is devised by synthesizing 
several design concepts that have hitherto not been 
explicitly linked, thereby generating new knowledge 
for the discipline of landscape architecture. Drawings, 
diagrams, and renderings produced through the 
synthetic design process are the object of discussion in 
the research (Seago and Dunne, 1999). 
13
COMPLEX 
ADAPTIVE 
SYSTEMS 
THEORY
ITERATIVE 
URBANISM
GREEN URBAN 
COMMONS
LANDSCAPE 
URBANISM
EMERGENCE 
THEORY
INTERSECTION OF 
KEY CONCEPTS
Figure 1.11: 
Landscape Type 
Diagram
14
PROBLEM
IDENTIFICATION
LITERATURE 
REVIEW
ACTION RESEARCH:
POPUP15
FRAMEWORK
DEVELOPMENT
Spatial Scaold
Social Structure
Materials Menu
SITE IDENTIFICATION
AND SITE-SPECIFIC 
FRAMEWORK
APPLICATION
DISCUSSION AND 
CONCLUSIONS
PROJECT GOAL:  Encourage the creation of green urban 
commons in San Diego’s mid-city and Southeastern 
communities as a means to improve resident quality of life 
and civic resilience.
OBJECTIVE: Present the argument 
that emergence theory can be used to 
enhance the landscape quality of green 
urban commons.
OBJECTIVE:   Identify potential sites for green urban commons 
development in San Diego’s Mid-City and Southeastern 
communities.
OBJECTIVE: Apply aspects of the framework to three 
unoccupied urban lots in the San Diego study area
- Determine potential activities and GUC scenarios 
- Present spatially-explicit drawing of landscape 
  interventions where the framework is applied.
OBJECTIVE: Reflect on design proposals and discuss 
generalizable principles that translate to other contexts.
OBJECTIVE: Informed by action research, create a framework 
for the development of green urban commons that embodies 
emergence theory.
- Propose a “Spatial Sca„old” approach to physical 
  development of green urban commons  
- Develop adaptive management strategies that allow 
  activities in GUCs to materialize and fluctuate over time
- Identify an adaptable materials palette and modular 
  “kit-of-parts” to accommodate varied activities
OBJECTIVE:   Collaborate with a group of community 
stakeholders on the initial design and construction of a new 
green urban commons.
- DESIGN  ITERATION -
New v5.0
Figure 1.12: Overall Research Project Structure
15
Similar context-specific research through design 
involving a physical framework, iteration, and synthetic 
design propositions are found in Walter Hood’s Blues & 
Jazz Landscape Improvisations (1993) and Urban Diaries 
(1997). Furthermore, student and professional design 
propositions presented in Rod Barnett’s Emergence 
in Landscape Architecture explore the application of 
emergence theory to landscape problems (2013). 
Although knowledge generated through this research 
project is context specific, results will help designers 
in similar circumstances rapidly yet e¥ectively design 
temporary urban spaces that promote civic participation 
and urban resilience. The resultant Framework and 
design propositions provide a base of knowledge that is 
highly transferable to design professionals and laypeople 
alike.
Document Structure
Research began with problematizing the presence of 
vacant land in San Diego through literature review and 
the researcher’s personal knowledge of context. This 
process is explicated here in this first chapter as well as 
in the chapter that follows. The Study Area Definition 
section of the next chapter also contains a summary of 
the sociopolitical and biophysical contexts of San Diego’s 
Mid-City and Southeastern communities. The next 
chapter also includes a description of the researcher’s 
endeavor to initiate, design, and implement a GUC project 
in partnership with a Business Improvement Association 
and coalition of nonprofit organizations. Knowledge and 
experience gained during this action research period 
informed the development of the proposed Framework 
for New Green Urban Commons. The Framework section 
is the heart of the document. It contains a description of 
the proposed Framework for the development of GUCs in 
San Diego’s city-owned vacant lots. Embodying several 
aspects of emergence theory, the Framework contains 
three key elements: 1) a “Spatial Sca¥old” approach to 
physical development of GUCs that is minimal, flexible, 
and open-ended enough to accommodate the unfolding 
of di¥erent uses; 2) “Social Structure” management 
guidelines to guide project initiation and allow activities 
within lots to fluctuate, materialize, and disappear over 
time; and 3) a modular, adaptable materials palette that 
can help non-professional builders to assemble, adapt, 
and repurpose physical elements within proposed urban 
commons. The next sections detail the mapping process 
used to identify potential sites for GUC development 
and describe application of the Framework to three 
unoccupied urban lots in the Mid-City/Southeastern 
San Diego study area. Potential activities and urban 
commons ‘scenarios’ are determined for each of the 
three sites, and spatially explicit drawings are shown 
for each landscape intervention. In the final chapter, 
Discussion, the limitations and advantages of the 
proposed Framework are discussed, particularly in 
regard Framework implementation, the application of 
emergence theory to GUC design, and the tension of 
designer involvement in GUC public space projects. The 
overall research project structure, along with specific 
project goals and objectives, is detailed further in Figure 
1.12.
RESEARCH PLAN
With the goal of encouraging the development of new 
GUCs in San Diego, this project has two primary aspects: 
1) a Framework for creating new GUCs in a specific study 
area of San Diego, and 2) site-specific design proposals for 
new GUCs that both embody principles of the Framework 
and exhibit characteristics of emergent landscape 
architecture (aœer Barnett, 2015). The Framework and 
design proposals methodically transpose concepts of 
iterative urban design, GUC, and emergence theory to a 
specific study area context in order to benefit a specific 
user group. New, contextually specific knowledge is 
generated through this synthetic research-through-
designing method.
Knowledge Claim
This project asserts a ‘pragmatic’ knowledge claim, as it 
is concerned primarily with “applications and solutions 
to problems within a specific context.”  Interested in 
discovering ‘what works’ for public space creation in San 
Diego, this pragmatic research through design project 
presents arguments for both the natural (postpositivistic 
knowledge) and socio-cultural (constructivist and 
participatory knowledge) implications of emergence 
theory and GUC (Lenzholzer et al., 2013). These 
multiple concepts are reconciled and synthesized into 
a set of contextually specific design proposals, and new 
knowledge for the discipline of landscape architecture 
revolves around how this knowledge is integrated into 
specific landscape propositions.
16
GREEN URBAN 
COMMONS 
LANDSCAPE
TYPE
SITE CONDITIONS
(Social and 
Environmental)
GREEN URBAN 
COMMONS 
USE PATTERN
(Framework and 
Design Propositions)
EMERGENCE
THEORY
SIX CHARACTERISTICS OF AN 
‘EMERGENT’ CIVIC LANDSCAPE
An intentional link to social activity 
and novel forms of occupation
A commitment to pluralism (strong 
emergence)
Explicit opportunities for the 
appearance of novel social 
properties 
Local control over local conditions
Consideration of same-level, 
top-down, and bottom-up influence
Defined relationshps between 
social systems and ecosystems
ITERATIVE 
URBANISM
1 -
2 -
3 -
4 -
5 -
6- 
CO
N
TE
XT
D
ES
IG
N
 
EX
P
R
ES
SI
O
N
G
U
ID
IN
G
 
P
R
IN
CI
P
LE
S
DESIGN 
PROCESS
Figure 1.13: Experimental Design Process Diagram
17
Experimental Design
In Composing Landscapes, Clemens Steenbergen 
classifies research through design projects into two 
types: “design experiments” and “experimental designs” 
(2008). This project can be considered an experimental 
design as it involves both a variable object (design 
expression) and variable context (Deming and Swa¥ield, 
2011). Experimental designs involve “making an integral 
spatial proposal,” and can be understood as “a form of 
heuristic research, geared to exploring a possible or 
predictable future and the methodical discovery of the 
right composition.” Steenbergen compares the cycle of 
research by design (“problem – analysis – generation 
of schematic compositional models – experimental 
design”) to the cycle of traditional empirical research 
(“defining the problem – analysis – generation of 
possible verifiable answers – hypothesis”) (2008). In this 
project, the experimental design process of problem 
identification, analysis, and schematic design is guided 
by two touchstone concepts: the GUC landscape type 
(aœer Colding and Barthel, 2013) and emergence theory 
as applied to landscape architectural practice (aœer 
Barnett, 2013).
DESIGN PROCESS
The theoretical concept of emergence was used to 
develop the Framework and site-specific design proposals 
in this project. Given this understanding, operative 
criteria for emergence theory were adapted from Rod 
Barnett’s Emergence in Landscape Architecture to guide 
the development of a framework for GUC creation and, in 
turn, spatially explicit landscape recommendations. The 
six “hallmarks” of an emergent civic space design were 
used by the researcher as a set of high-level organizing 
instructions to inform Framework structure and design 
scenario expressions for each sample site. This process 
is detailed in Figure 1.13 whereby emergent civic design 
criteria are depicted as the touchstone principles for 
design expression. 
Role of the Researcher/Designer 
The proposed Framework and design propositions 
account for grassroots management and iterative 
development of GUCs. Design process and methods 
used in this project and proposed by the Framework 
intentionally emulate the way that a professional 
landscape architect might approach the pro-bono 
design of a GUC when working with a stakeholder group. 
The reason behind this is that grassroots, community-
led e¥orts to develop vacant city-owned land will likely 
have very little funding, and whatever few resources 
are available will need to be used both judiciously and 
e¥iciently. Project budgets for new GUCs are more likely 
to rely on volunteer labor, focusing on the procurement 
of materials for site improvements rather than 
professional design or surveying services. To this end the 
researcher used simple, accessible tools such as LIDAR-
derived topographic data and Google Earth to develop 
schematic designs for the new GUCs. Furthermore, the 
site inventory and documentation process for each of 
the sites occurred during brief windows of time similar 
to what a professional landscape architect might be 
able to accomplish on an aœernoon or weekend visit to 
a pre-identified site. Photographs using a smartphone, 
baseline measurements recorded in the field, as well as 
brief, infrequent visits to the site for observation outside 
of regular business hours a provide a contextual basis for 
spatial design recommendations.
In addition to these pragmatic considerations for user-led 
GUC design, Barnett shares some guidelines regarding 
the role of a landscape architect who is designing a civic 
space that takes seriously the fundamental propositions 
of emergence. In short, the designer is responsible for 
describing the desired relationship between social 
systems and ecosystems within the design context. 
This entails a thorough understanding of “the situation” 
surrounding the site, whereby the site and stakeholders 
inform what potential activities and programmatic 
elements are most desired within the space. That 
said, Barnett specifies that the designer is not entirely 
responsible for mandating an enduring or fixed design 
program. On the contrary, the designer is “not a purveyor 
of top-down solutions but a discoverer of emergent 
processes,” and they are instead responsible for 
establishing “an initial set of conditions…that generates 
a process of realization” (2013). Furthermore, given the 
understanding that individual stakeholders should have 
maximum control over the ongoing evolution of the 
space, the designer’s role becomes one characterized by 
definition, contextualization, and facilitation.
Due to the desired emergence characteristics (see Figure 
1.13) and the likely brevity of the a landscape architect’s 
involvement on this project type, end-users of GUCs are 
18
understood as the agents responsible for the progressive 
iteration of use patterns, site element arrangement, and 
activities within individual GUCs. This project proposes 
that an emergentist landscape architect’s role in GUC 
design be restrained to that of a ‘guide by the side’ rather 
than a ‘sage on the stage.’ Each aspect of the Framework 
considers the fact that stakeholders need to ensure 
ongoing urban commons management as social capital 
materializes and dissipates. 
Action Research
The researcher’s role in the conceptual design and 
construction of PopUp15 was a formative aspect of 
this project. Limited funding was available to develop 
the initial “Spatial Sca¥old” build-out of the site, and 
a community-based bicycle workshop organization 
currently operates out of one of the storage containers. 
Additional partners, including a youth arts organization, 
a church, and a community advocacy organization 
have all expressed interest in using parts of the site for 
both temporary and ephemeral activities. In addition 
to interviewing project partners to discuss build-out 
options, the researcher conducted two outreach events 
at movie screenings that were held outdoors at the 
PopUp15 site. Although the Boulevard BIA is ultimately 
responsible for the space and is the leaseholder with 
the city, the collective management strategies put 
forward by the BIA trend toward a GUC management 
pattern. Action research for PopUp15 was integral to the 
development of the Framework for new GUCs described 
later in this document. Design propositions that follow in 
the Assemblage Design Scenario section detail varied site 
configurations to accommodate the progression of uses 
on the lot over time.
Drawing & Making
Barnett recommends, “an emergentist landscape 
architect will combine techniques of reconnaissance 
and imaginative forensics” through “expressive drawing, 
writing, and photography that are adequate to the 
multiplicities that comprise the field in which he or she 
is immersed” (2013). Furthermore, drawing, draœing, 
and physical modeling are recognized as methods for 
creating and refining form in pragmatic/constructivist 
research through design method (Lenzholzer et al., 2013). 
These actions were used to iterate the overall project 
Framework and express potential schemes for each site. 
Individual schematic drawings and model compositions 
were evaluated according to their adherence to the 
emergence criteria listed in Figure 1.13. The use of 
physical models with modular parts was particularly 
helpful in design process, as the pieces could be 
disassembled and reconfigured into various potential 
user-determined site compositions. Photographs of 
these site models are shown in Figures 1.14-1.17.
The next two chapters detail the culmination of the design 
process as guided by project context and emergence 
theory. A three-part Framework for the development 
of GUCs throughout the study area is described along 
with potential design scenario expressions for each of 
the three sample sites. A discussion chapter follows this 
where the relevance, transferability, and success of the 
Framework is discussed.
19
Figure 1.14: 
Researcher 
workspace with 
drawings, models, 
and creative 
collage
I 
20
Figure 1.16: Martin Ave Study Models
Figure 1.15: Market Street Hillside Study Model
21
Figure 1.17: 
PopUp15 Study 
Model with 
modular grid 
configurations
I 

23
In the preceding chapter, the assertion was made that the creation of green 
urban commons (GUC’s) in underserved communities can enhance urban 
resilience and resident quality of life. This research project also argues that 
the application of emergence theory to the creation of iterative GUC’s can 
enhance landscape function and lower barriers to creating these “safe to fail” 
public space projects. Given this understanding, the question remains: just 
where, and by what means might landscape architects engage in the creation 
of GUC’s?
This chapter describes the definition of a study area spanning several of San 
Diego’s Mid-City and Southeastern communities. Following a description 
of study area context, details of an action research project for a new GUC, 
PopUp15, are discussed. Discoveries made during the the PopUp15 project 
informed the basis of a Framework for GUC development that embodies the 
principles of emergence theory. Following a description of the Framework for 
New GUCs, site-specific Assemblage Design Scenarios are presented as case 
study applications. In addition to the PopUp15 site, two additional GUCs were 
identified within the study area using specific site identification criteria. The 
three sites are detailed and site-specific GUC design propositions are depicted 
for each. The PopUp15 site is revisited for further design in order to envision 
possible landscape scenarios as the project evolves into the future. 
THE WORK:
Study Area Definition
Action Research: PopUp15
Framework for New Green Urban Commons
Green Urban Commons Project Process
Site Selection and Existing Conditions
Assemblage Design Scenarios
24
In this project, publicly owned vacant urban tax lot parcels are used as a forum 
to test and evaluate the application of emergent landscape architectural 
practice to GUC design. The site selection process is based upon a body of 
literature that suggests the transformation of vacant urban land to GUC’s will 
increase urban resilience and enhance resident quality of life in underserved 
communities (Burkholder, 2012; Colding and Barthel, 2013; Colding et al., 2013; 
Radywyl and Biggs, 2013; Dennis and James, 2016). San Diego was selected as 
the urban setting for this project because of the  researcher’s existing contextual 
knowledge, availability of GIS data, physical convenience for conducting 
site visits during the summer and winter of 2016, as well as an opportunity 
to collaboratively design a pop-up park with a team of nonprofits headed by 
the El Cajon Boulevard Business Improvement Association (Boulevard BIA). 
A contiguous study area within San Diego consisting of the city’s most low-
income and disadvantaged communities was defined in order to increase the 
potential social impact of this project and identify opportunities for case study 
GUC designs.
This research project has two operative definitions for what constitutes 
a vacant lot. The first is a parcel with the assigned description “Vacant & 
Undeveloped” on the 2016 SanGIS Land Use map. The second definition of a 
vacant lot is a parcel listed as an “active” San Diego city park that currently has 
no physical improvements to accommodate visitor use or access. This second 
vacant land classification was determined for four sites within the study area 
by a ground-truth visual assessment. At a glance, the municipality of San Diego 
has over 31.4 square miles (20,096 acres) of public and privately owned land 
listed as “Vacant & Undeveloped” across 4,204 individual parcels. The City of 
San Diego owns 467.44 acres of this land across 322 parcels (SanGIS, 2016). 
Study Area Definition
The definition of the 23 square mile study area (Figure 2.1.1) and citywide 
identification of vacant land began with the procurement of spatial data from 
San Diego Geographic Information Source (SanGIS). These GIS files included: 
current and historic land use (in 4-6 year increments back to 1986), parcels 
(including ownership data), city parks, stormwater infrastructure, stream 
locations, and sensitive water quality areas. Information from SanGIS also 
included overlay maps of the city’s Renewal Communities, Community Plan 
areas, Business improvement Districts (BID’s), and a Federal Promise Zone 
overlay.
STUDY AREA DEFINITION
25
Study Area 
Boundary
1 MI N
DOWNTOWN
SAN DIEGO
HARBOR
DOWNTOWN
MISSION BAY
SKYLINE/
PARADISE HILLS
SAN DIEGO
HARBOR
CORONADO
POINT
LOMA
MISSION VALLEY
CLAIREMONT 
MESA
TIERRASANTA
MCASD 
MIRAMAR
LA JOLLA
S.D.S.U.
NATIONAL
CITY
CHULA VISTA
TIJUANA, MX
IMPERIAL BEACH
SAN YSIDRO
BALBOA
PARK
EAST 
VILLAGE
STUDY AREA
Figure 2.1.1: San Diego Context Map
26
The study area boundary was drawn using the 
boundaries of community plan areas that intersected 
the Federal Promise Zone, Redevelopment District, and 
Boulevard BIA (Figure 2.2). The idea behind the boundary 
was twofold. The first reason was to determine, by criteria 
found during literature review, the area in San Diego 
that would provide opportunities for maximum positive 
potential impact of new GUC’s. In their article Rethinking 
urban transformation: Temporary uses for vacant land, 
Nemeth and Langhorst (2013) provide a list of conditions 
appropriate for temporary land use interventions. 
These criteria includes “areas seeking redevelopment, 
attraction of new residents and businesses” and “active 
community/ residents/ non-profits/ small investors”. The 
Renewal Communities and Federal Promise Zone SanGIS 
maps define areas that intentionally cultivate private 
and public sector redevelopment e¥orts through a suite 
of permissive policies and tax incentives. Furthermore, 
these areas benefit from specialized social programs 
and public aid that could potentially support the 
development of citizen-led GUC projects. BID’s and other 
community organizations like the Jacobs Center for 
Neighborhood Innovation in the Encanto community fall 
within Nemeth and Langhorst’s (2013) criteria for active 
nonprofit organizations that may support temporary land 
use e¥orts. To this end, the mid-city communities at the 
north end of the study area were included because they 
intersect the Boulevard BIA, a place-based organization 
that has been consistently active in temporary land use 
projects. The second key consideration when drawing the 
study area boundary was to ensure a large enough area 
to encompass a diverse array of vacant lots, yet not one 
so large that the  researcher would find it impossible to 
conduct a su¥icient number of site visits to the included 
communities over a two-week period between December 
2016 and January 2017.
Community plan areas were chosen as the primary grain 
of boundary determination, as planning decisions about 
development, transportation, parks, and public space are 
oœen made according to these political units. In addition, 
drawing the study boundary lines along community 
plan areas provided a more focused look at population 
demographics. A detailed comparison of these 
communities (except for the East Village neighborhood of 
downtown, which falls within the Centre City community 
plan) is shown in Figure 2.1.4.
Study Area Context
To better understand the potential for GUC development 
in San Diego, one must first grasp the essence of the 
city’s biophysical and social context. The city, renown 
ed for its world-class beaches and mild weather, can 
be understood as a postindustrial urban center. With 
no large-scale landscape-based industrial enterprise to 
drive development, the city grew slowly from Spanish 
Figure 2.1.2: Mural 
in Southeastern 
San Diego
27
Renewal Community
Federal Promise Zone
Business 
Improvement District
City-Owned Vacant 
Land
Study Area 
Boundary
Community Plan Area 
Boundary
Case Study 
Site 1/2 MI N
DOWNTOWN
SAN DIEGO
HARBOR
MISSION VALLEY
S.D.S.U.
NATIONAL
CITY
SKYLINE/
PARADISE HILLS
BALBOA
PARK
BARRIO 
LOGAN
EAST 
VILLAGE SOUTHEASTERN SAN DIEGO
EASTERN 
SAN DIEGOCITY HEIGHTS
ENCANTO
GOLDEN 
HILL
MARTIN AVE. 
PARK
MARKET ST.
HILL
POPUP15
Figure 2.1.3: Study Area Map
28
colonization in 1769 up to the mid-20th century. San 
Diego began to flourish as a modern urban center during 
and aœer World War II as the large infrastructure projects 
of the Metropolitan Water District of Los Angeles began 
to deliver a consistent supply of fresh water to Southern 
California (Reisner, 1986). A consequence of WWII and 
the city’s large harbor, the Marine Corps and Navy has 
a strong presence in the city. The federal government 
continues to serve as the region’s largest employer, 
followed by the healthcare industry.
Climate & Ecology
San Diego has a mild, Mediterranean climate with hot, 
dry summers and cool, wet winters (SDSU, 2015). The 
average annual high temperature is 69.9 degrees (F), with 
an average annual low temperature of 56.5 (WRCC, 2016). 
Annual rainfall averages around 10 inches, 85% of which 
occurs November through March (NOAA, 2016). Water 
scarcity is a primary landscape design consideration, 
followed closely by stormwater management during the 
region’s infrequent rain events. San Diego is the most 
biologically rich county in the nation, with “approximately 
200 [rare or endangered] plants and animals—more than 
in any other county in the nation” (Nature Conservancy, 
2017). Considerable conservation e¥orts have been made 
throughout the county, and San Diego has a diverse 
range of an environmental organizations working within 
city limits to protect wildlife habitat, increase ecosystem 
services, and alleviate negative urban environmental 
impacts.
Topography & Hydrology
From the time the indigenous Kumeyaay people 
inhabited the area through Spanish colonization, 
Mexican independence, and annexation by the United 
States, the region’s topographical features have largely 
dictated human settlement patterns. While Old Town 
San Diego was sited near the San Diego River, the current 
downtown core sits at the base of a series of mesas and 
adjacent to a large harbor lined with military installations 
and industry. Housing development from the early 20th 
century through the postwar era was concentrated on the 
mesas north of downtown, leaving a network of canyons 
that drain water either north toward the San Diego river 
and Mission Valley, or south toward the harbor through 
the Pueblo watershed.  The majority of the project study 
area falls within the Pueblo watershed, whose waterways 
remain channelized, choked with invasive plants, or 
burdened by stormwater runo¥.
Promise Zone
In addition to falling within the approximate bounds 
of the Pueblo Watershed, the study area includes an 
Obama-era federal Promise Zone. Identified by the U.S. 
Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), 
the San Diego Promise Zone includes three of the city’s 
most economically challenged neighborhoods. The 
Promise Zone is characterized by “high unemployment, 
low educational attainment, insu¥icient access to 
healthy foods, concentrated poverty, rising crime, and 
the least a¥ordable housing in the nation.” The area has 
a population of 77,241, a poverty rate of 39.06%, and an 
unemployment rate of 15.61%. Youth unemployment is 
also a pressing concern, as 40.1% of young people in the 
area aged 16-24 are unemployed compared to 20.5% in 
other parts of the city.
A group of partners led by the City of San Diego and 
Jacobs Center for Neighborhood Innovation have 
identified six goals to “improve the quality of life and 
accelerate revitalization” in the Promise Zone: 1) create 
jobs, 2) improve economic activity; 3) reduce violent 
crime, 4) expand educational opportunities, 5) access 
top-quality a¥ordable housing, and 6) promote health 
and access to healthcare (HUD, 2016). A positive impact 
can be made toward achieving several of these goals, as 
GUC’s on vacant land stand to improve individual health 
outcomes  reduce crime (Garvin et al., 2012; Pearsall and 
Lucas, 2014). Furthermore, HUD cites rezoning, vacant 
land along high tra¥ic corridors, and public transit as 
key assets within the Promise Zone that can be built 
upon to “bring economic vitality to these underserved 
communities” (2016).  The Promise Zone designation is 
particularly relevant because two of the sample design 
sites fall within its boundaries.
29
Barrio Logan
Community Plan Areas
Southeastern Greater         Golden Hill Encanto
City Heights 
(Mid-City)
Eastern         
(Mid-City)
Study Area 
Totals
San Diego 
Jurisdiction
Area (Square Mi) 0.862 4.577 1.165 5.954 4.587 4.867 22 (+1 Outside C.P. Areas) 372.1
Population 4,865 56,757 15,848 47,361 74,062 37,431 236,324 1,301,617
Population Density 
(People/Sq.Mi.)
5,643.9 12,400.5 13,603.4 7,954.5 16,146.1 7,690.8 10,573.2 3,498
Race (US Census Categories)
Hispanic 72% 83% 44% 50% 58% 33% 58% 29%
White 16% 4% 45% 7% 11% 30% 14% 45%
Black 7% 9% 5% 24% 12% 16% 14% 6%
Asian 2% 2% 3% 15% 16% 16% 12% 16%
Other 2% 2% 4% 4% 3% 4% 3% 4%
Population Under Age 18 28% 34% 18% 30% 32% 25% 30% 21%
Population Age 65 and Older 7% 6% 6% 10% 6% 10% 7% 11%
Individuals Over Age 25 with Less 
than High School Education
40% 52% 19% 33% 39% 20% 36% 14%
Individuals Over Age 5 Speaking a 
Non-English Language at Home
62% 78% 43% 57% 73% 42% 64% 39%
Individuals Below Poverty Level 41% 34% 17% 22% 29% 17% 26% 14%
Median Household Income $26,761 $31,414 $46,476 $43,668 $33,549 $48,155 - $63,198
Median Housing Value $428,906 $351,456 $509,879 $337,864 $351,347 $368,778 - $506,107
Median Age 30.8 27 33.1 31.1 28.4 31.8 - 33.8
Unemployment Rate 22.00% 14.20% 5.90% 11.30% 11.20% 10.80% - 8.40%
Data Source: SANDAG Regional Data Warehouse, constructed from U.S. Census Bureaus American Community Survey 2010 (extracted on: 5/18/2017)
Figure 2.1.4: Study Area Socioeconomic Information
30
Between May and December of 2016, the researcher engaged with the El Cajon 
Boulevard Business Improvement Association (Boulevard BIA) and other City 
Heights community organizations to develop a new GUC on the PopUp15 site 
described in the Methods chapter. Although the Framework detailed in this 
document had not yet been fully named and developed, nearly each aspect 
of the Spatial Sca¥old, Materials Menu, and Social Structure components 
were integral to project execution. In turn, action research on the PopUp15 
project informed and helped to refine the building blocks of the framework. 
Despite the fact that the project was not explicitly called a GUC, the oversight 
and management of the space is similar enough to ascribe the title and draw 
parallels to the Framework.
PILOT PROJECT: POPUP15
31
Phase 1: Project Start-Up 
(February – July 2016)
Site ID & Selection
The PopUp15 site is located within the district of the El Cajon Boulevard 
Business Improvement Association (Boulevard BIA) at the intersection of 
El Cajon Boulevard and Central Avenue in the City Heights Community of 
San Diego. Between 2015 and 2016, the Boulevard BIA partnered with a 
local chapter of the Urban Land Institute (ULI) on a study that included 
identification of transit-oriented mixed-use development opportunities in 
City Heights. The PopUp15 lot, owned by the City of San Diego and vacant for 
over 26 years, was identified by ULI as a site that could potentially host a new 
mixed-use development to compliment the nearby public transit platform on 
the Interstate 15 overpass. The study began a conversation about the future 
of the PopUp15 site, and the BIA chose to develop it as a temporary pop-
up park to integrate with its ‘placemaking’ e¥orts. From the beginning, the 
Boulevard BIA’s interest has been to activate the site with programming and 
catalyze discussion about the future of the space, allowing the temporary site 
intervention to influence more permanent change. 
Stakeholder Mobilization
The Boulevard BIA was intentional about stakeholder outreach.  A 
‘placemaking’ college student intern with the BIA contacted potential 
stakeholders, announcing the opportunity to access the lot and inviting other 
groups to participate in GUC oversight. Groups that were contacted included: 
teachers at two local High Schools, a community development corporation, 
a sustainable transportation organization, a public health coalition, an urban 
agriculture organization, a community advocacy network, and a refugee 
resettlement organization. Several contacts from these groups expressed 
interest in accessing the PopUp15 space at some future date, and a select few 
were in a position to o¥er tangible resources or time toward initial landscape 
development.
A kicko¥ event at the PopUp15 site was held in late May 2016 to coincide with a 
report of the ULI study and invite potential stakeholders to the site. Following 
preliminary discussions, a community-based bicycle advocacy organization, 
Bikes del Pueblo, submitted a formal proposal to the BIA to use a portion of 
the lot to host a drop-in bicycle repair workshop. In exchange, Bikes del Pueblo 
32
o¥ered to sta¥ a monthly “bicycle valet” for cyclists 
interested in using the adjacent rapid transit bus for their 
commute. In addition to the bicycle workshop, the BIA 
collaborated with the Media Arts Center of San Diego 
to host a 3-week outdoor film series on the PopUp15 
site during July 2016 as part of its project start-up. Each 
of these events and arrangements led to collaborative 
decision-making about resource sharing, mutual benefit, 
and site improvements. To use Framework terms, 
members of the Boulevard BIA and Bikes del Pueblo 
became the de-facto Stewardship Team of the PopUp15 
GUC, though neither was specifically called such during 
the course of action research.
Designer Engagement
Designer engagement began with a series of phone 
conversations between the researcher and Boulevard BIA 
sta¥ between February and June of 2016. The researcher, 
assuming the role of design consultant for the PopUp15 
project, began by submitting a proposal for volunteer 
involvement and a detailed 12-week work plan spanning 
mid-June through early September of 2016. Deliverables 
outlined in the proposal and agreed upon by the BIA 
were:
• Programmatic ideas for the lot generated 
during interviews with the BIA, area residents, 
and potential project partners
• Design drawings for the lot including a site 
plan and conceptual sketches (i.e. a site survey, 
Spatial Sca¥old design, and build-out scenario 
projection to be used for fundraising)
• Coordination of one (minimum) community 
event centered on physical site improvements 
that could include construction of Spatial 
Sca¥old elements or site amenities (ex. 
benches, planters, stage, furniture, etc.), 
dependent upon funding
• Assistance developing guidelines and strategies 
for project maintenance over the three-year 
project lifespan
These deliverables correlate loosely to several of the ten 
“Outcomes” described in the Project Process diagrams 
(Figures 3.4.2 - 3.2.4). Although some responsibilities were 
expanded outside of this initial list of deliverables, it was 
beneficial to begin the pro-bono designer-stakeholder 
relationship with a detailed timeline and clearly 
articulated list of outcomes. The list and timeline helped 
both parties maintain clear and realistic expectations 
during the course of their working relationship, and it 
ensured that the landscape was set upon a trajectory 
toward emergent characteristics.
Out of initial discussions with the Stewardship Team, it 
also became clear to the researcher that a concise set of 
project goals would help to determine collective values 
and objectives (Framework Outcome 1), guide project 
development, and attract additional stakeholders. 
Collaborative discussions with the BIA led to the 
formation of the following three goals for the PopUp15 
project:
• Serve as a flexible and adaptable outdoor 
space for community events
• Provide green open space for the City Heights 
community
• Engage City Heights residents in the physical 
construction of site elements
The establishment of value-based goals helps to ensure 
the development of landscape objectives that fulfill 
additional desired outcomes (listed in Figures 3.4.2 - 
3.2.4). For example, engaging City Heights residents 
in physical construction means that elements should 
be able to be built by non-experts (tied to Outcomes 6 
and 7). Stipulating that the open space be “green” led 
to the construction of planter boxes and a discussion 
about pollinator-friendly plants, helping to formalize 
relationships between social systems and ecosystems 
(Outcome 2).  Declaring that the space should serve as 
a flexible and adaptable outdoor space for community 
events was intentionally meant to attract a diverse range 
of additional stakeholders and project participants (tied 
to Outcomes 4, 9, and 10).
Following the establishment of a work plan, deliverables, 
and project goals, the researcher contacted potential 
project partners and other stakeholders that had been 
previously identified by the Boulevard BIA. In-person or 
phone interviews were conducted so that the researcher 
could gain a better sense of the interests and physical 
requirements of each group. Interviews began with a 
review the PopUp15 project goals established by the 
Stewardship Team. The line of questioning included: 
• What activities would your organization be 
interested in hosting on the PopUp15 site?
33
Figure 2.2.1: Images from the Cine Carretera event
34
• What physical elements or infrastructure would 
need to be provided to successfully host your 
event(s)?
• How many event attendees do you anticipate?
• What is your future vision for the vacant lot?
• What do you envision as some of the key 
opportunities and constraints to the success of 
the PopUp15 project? 
• Are there any potential uses for the site that 
have not been identified by the BIA? 
The researcher conducted interviews with Bikes 
del Pueblo, the Media Arts Center, the Rock Church 
located across the street, and a local refugee youth arts 
organization called the Aja Project. Levels of involvement 
varied from complete organizational relocation and 
investment in the site (Bikes del Pueblo), to temporary 
event-based involvement (Media Arts Center), to 
aspirational involvement if funding were to materialize 
(Aja project). The Media Arts Center, for example, 
expressed interest in hosting their initial Cine Carretera 
film series as well as future outdoor movie screenings 
if it were able to secure appropriate resources and 
funding. The Aja Project, interested in a more permanent 
venue to host its student art exhibits, expressed interest 
in converting a shipping container on the site into a 
gallery. It did not, however, have any immediate funds to 
contribute toward that e¥ort. 
In addition to stakeholder interviews, the researcher 
visited two of San Diego’s established pop-up parks, 
Silo at Maker’s Quarter and the Quartyard, for analogous 
inspiration and precedent research.  The researcher 
also spent time visiting library archives, studying aerial 
images, mapping, sketching, walking the site, and taking 
photos to gain a better understanding of the lot.  Visits 
were intentionally made during a range of hours to gain 
a sense of the site at di¥erent times of day. A coarse 
site survey was also conducted, and a set of measured 
drawings was produced.
The researcher also set up a booth during Media Art 
Center’s Cine Carretera Movie screenings during July 
2016. At the time of the film screenings, all that existed 
on the site was a 40’ shipping container used by the 
BIA for storage. The remainder of the site was largely 
unimproved. Representatives from the Media Arts Center, 
BIA, and the researcher set up tables, chairs, and a 
portable film projector for each screening (Figure 2.2.1). 
At two separate film events in the series, the researcher 
set up a “vision board” featuring a photographic collage 
of potential activities and amenities for the PopUp15 
site, including some items that had been mentioned by 
the stakeholders (Figure 2.2.1). Participants were then 
invited to select their two favorite and one least-favorite 
images from the board using colored dot stickers. Visitors 
to the booth were also encouraged to leave a post-it note 
detailing what they would like to see occur in the lot, 
though this activity was less popular than the photo vote. 
It became clear that attendees were interested in:
• Children’s play equipment
• Green planting areas and vegetation
• Food trucks and vendors
• A swap meet or open-air market
In addition to the outreach booth activities, it was also 
valuable for the researcher to observe event attendees’ 
use of the unimproved vacant lot site. Children were 
attracted to the northwest corner of the lot, and 
attendees did not tend to linger near the alleyway. People 
seemed generally comfortable with the arrangement of 
chairs, screen, and stage placement. The preliminary, 
pre-construction events also attracted several neighbors 
and allowed them to exchange contact information with 
the Stewardship Team.
Spatial Sca’old Design
Prior to creating the Spatial Sca¥old presentation drawing 
meant to secure approval from the City’s Development 
Services department, the researcher generated a site 
plan for stakeholder fundraising and grant writing e¥orts 
(Figure 2.2.5). Although the BIA and Bikes del Pueblo 
had a small budgets allocated for the project, they 
had to continue seeking additional funding in order to 
carry out their vision for the space and construct site 
elements. These fundraising drawings were a synthesis of 
stakeholder interviews Stewardship Team aspirations for 
the space. The result was a similar type of GUC scenario 
projection as those detailed in the Assemblage chapter, 
and this initial drawing iteration helped to inform initial 
Spatial Sca¥old design.
A key organizing element of the initial Spatial Sca¥old 
was the placement of shipping containers, as they would 
be di¥icult to relocate or move during later spatial 
iterations. One 40’ container running east to west along 
the northern edge of the site was already placed and in 
use by the BIA, though Bikes del Pueblo was prepared to 
35
Figure 2.2.2: Scheme A - Concept Diagram 
for PopUp15
Figure 2.2.3: Scheme B - Concept Diagram 
for PopUp15
Figure 2.2.4: Scheme C - Concept Diagram 
for PopUp15
36
Figure 2.2.5: Drawing used for fundraising e’ orts
El Cajon Blvd.
C
en
tr
al
 A
ve
.
13
Bicycle Storage
Multi-Use Platform with Shade Structure
Bikes del Pueblo Workshop Area
Bicycle Valet Parking
Main Entry
Shaded Cafe Seating
Temporary Awnings for Events
Trees in Box Planters
Fenced Storage Area
Food Trucks
Community Art Gallery (Modified Container)
Rainwater Harvesting Tanks
LEGEND
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
PopUp15
Draft Site Plan - July 8, 2016
 10’
11
1
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
12
10
13 Urban Prairie Garden
secure an additional container to serve as their workshop 
and supply storage space. Several configurations 
were drawn and evaluated (Figures 2.2.2 - 2.2.4), and 
the researcher settled upon two schemes worthy of 
presentation to the Stewardship Team (Figures 2.2.6 and 
2.2.7). The Stewardship Team and researcher decided it 
best to place a second 40’ container along the western 
property line. This way, the container could double as a 
mural wall and perimeter wall, enclosing the Bikes del 
Pueblo workshop area while permitting views into the lot 
from the street.
Another key organizing element of the initial Spatial 
Sca¥ old design was a paved entry plaza for both ADA 
access to the site and the Bikes del Pueblo workshop 
space (preliminary sketch shown in Figure 2.2.9). The 
edges of the paved area were articulated to accommodate 
small 10’ containers along the southern property line 
in the future. The additional containers could serve a 
wide range of potential functions and would not be as 
obtrusive as another full-length unit. Prior to additional 
10’ container purchase, the articulated edge could also 
accommodate a food truck or entry booth.
Another immediate priority for Spatial Sca¥ old design 
was treatment of the ground plane on the entire site. 
Even small gusts of wind th ough the lot would blow up 
noticeable amounts of dust, and there was a tremendous 
amount of broken glass, rubble, and trash spread 
throughout the property. The initial Spatial Sca¥ old 
design called for removing the top layer of material and 
replacing it with stabilized decomposed granite. 
Institutional Support
Following initial site identification, the Boulevard BIA 
approached the City of San Diego’s development services 
department about use of the space for placemaking 
e¥ orts. The city and BIA negotiated a one-year lease 
agreement signed into e¥ ect on May 2, 2016. The lease 
included the following key stipulations:
• The property may be used as a “public 
gathering place”
• Allowed uses are “outdoor community activities 
and events” with written consent needed in the 
event of other desired uses
• Proper event permits must be secured if 
necessary
• There are to be “no permanent infrastructure or 
improvements” on the site
• Lessee may utilize temporary landscaping in 
pots/containers, temporary removable seating, 
portable shading, and temporary removable 
performance area
• Lessee (BIA) holds “Commercial General 
Liability” insurance and places a $1000 security 
deposit down with the city. The BIA was 
37
Figure 2.2.7: PopUp15 preliminary design drawing - Option B
Figure 2.2.6: PopUp15 preliminary design drawing - Option A
38
Figure 2.2.8: Plan submitted to City for review with revision notes
also responsible for paying a one-time lease 
execution fee of $980.
• Rent is waived provided lessee holds a 
minimum of four community events annually 
(one per quarter).
• The lease may be renewed annually
The Spatial Sca¥old design was drawn and negotiated 
in accordance with the initial lease terms, as the 
Stewardship Team did not want to undergo a permitting 
process for site developments. Upon reviewing 
preliminary design drawings, Development Services 
provided the following additional recommendations:
• Do not dig beyond 4’
• Vehicle access and egress from the lot to the 
alleyway must adhere to guidelines similar 
to those of a construction site by using a 
compacted gravel driveway,
• Ensure ADA access from the southwest street 
corner using concrete pavers.
• No wooden stages or other structures may be 
constructed without a permit
• Overhead structures other than shade sails 
would are permitted without further review
Each of these points was reconciled, and a more finalized 
Spatial Sca¥old drawing (one that more closely adhered 
to development code and the specific requirements of 
the BIA’s lease agreement) was cleared for construction 
by Development Services  (Figure 2.2.10).
39
El Cajon Blvd.
C
en
tr
al
 A
ve
.
Bikes del Pueblo Storage (8’x40’ Container)
Performance Area with Removable Shade Sail
Bikes del Pueblo Workshop w/ Pavers & Shade
Bicycle Valet Parking Area
Perimeter 6‘ Tall Chain Link Fence, 12’ Gates
Seating Area
Temporary Awnings for Events
Trees in Box Planters
Fenced Storage Area
Food Truck
Shipping Container
Rainwater Harvesting Tanks
LEGEND
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
PopUp15
Site Plan - 8/23/16
 10’
11
1
2
3 4
15
17
5
6
13
7
8
9 12
10
13 Outdoor Cafe Area
14 Children’s Play Area With Tetherball
15 Bike Racks on Poured Concrete Pad
16 Coffee Cart or Donated Wooden Bar w/ Shade Sail
17 Gravel/Rubble Driveway and Carpark (25’ Deep)
2” Deep Decomposed Granite Throughout Site
14
Figure 2.2.10: PopUp15 plan approved by the City’s Development Services department
Figure 2.2.9: Site plan revision notes from 
Development Services
40
Phase 2: Initial Development 
(August – December 2016)
Collaborative Design
Aœer gaining approval for site improvements, negotiations continued between 
the Stewardship Team members about budget and construction priorities. 
The researcher conferred with the Stewardship Team about budget and 
construction priorities in an informal fashion, and rough cost estimates were 
documented on Figures 2.2.6 and 2.2.7 during conversation with the group. 
These conversations were especially important regarding the treatment of the 
ground plane, as many options were too expensive for the existing BIA budget. 
Initiating public access to the site, obtaining a second shipping container, and 
a flat, paved space for the Bikes del Pueblo workshop emerged as the most 
important priorities.
Material Selection
The Materials Menu did not exist by name during PopUp15 action research, 
though the researcher employed the same guiding notions to select materials. 
The researcher and Stewardship Team decided that the materials used on site 
should be inexpensive and possess modular, adaptive, or multi-functional 
qualities. 
The site’s full exposure to the sun made construction of shade an imperative, 
so shade sails were used in combination with anchor poles sunk into 
concrete-filled tires. The entryway plaza was built with sand-set 1’x1’ pavers 
that could be reset and relocated. Basket planters made of hardware cloth 
and repurposed palettes were constructed to hold soil and low-water plants. 
Material donations were sought out including tires, pallets, gravel, and shelves 
for the bicycle workshop. It was decided that the BIA would cover the cost of 
decomposed granite for the site, and large pieces of donated construction 
rubble were used at the driveway area adjacent to the alleyway.
Initial Landscape Construction
Four construction kick-o¥ work parties were held over the course of four 
weekends spanning August and September of 2017. Volunteers from the 
Stewardship Team and other community members helped to clear the site, 
level the pad for the second storage container, and construct both planter beds 
and shade sail posts. Between September and December 2016, the containers 
41
Figure 2.2.11: Bikes del Pueblo Volunteers 
constructing posts for shade sails
Figure 2.2.12: PopUp15 during site leveling 
and initial construction
Figure 2.2.13: Bikes del Pueblo workshop 
space a¦er initial construction
42
were professionally painted, the interior of the second container was outfitted 
as the Bikes del Pueblo workshop, and the entry patio area was constructed. 
In late December 2016, the paver patio was constructed and local contractor 
was hired to level the site and spread layers of decomposed granite. The site 
has since assumed its intended functions as a bicycle workshop, community 
event venue, and green open space.
Figure 2.2.14: Bikes del Pueblo banners advertising services at PopUp15
43
Phase 3: Ongoing Management
(January 2017 – Present)
Although the Boulevard BIA is ultimately responsible for the space and is 
the leaseholder with the city, the collective management strategies put 
forward by the BIA trend toward a GUC management pattern. Administrative 
management, budgeting, and decision-making for the project became 
integrated within the existing nonprofit structure. Weekly PopUp15 committee 
meetings held were held during the course of the researcher’s involvement, 
and these meetings continue to be held on a regular basis. Fortunately, the BIA 
had dedicated sta¥ time to help facilitate oversight of the GUC. The group has 
hitherto been open and transparent about its budget and project oversight, 
and there remains an open call for community members to use the PopUp15 
site as a venue for events and activities.
As of January 2017 the future of the PopUp15 site is yet to be determined, 
though the BIA asserted at the beginning of the project that its role would re-
evaluated on an annual basis, with a project duration totaling 3 to 5 years. 
The underlying values and project goals that guide the PopUp15 intervention 
indicate that the space will continue to evolve and iterate over this period. 
Several possible futures for the space are presented later in the Assemblage 
Design Scenario section of this document, revealing how the space might 
evolve dependent upon social capital and resources.
44
Figure 2.2.15: PopUp15 in January 2017 following initial construction
45
46
Figure 2.6.16: PopUp15 in May 2017 (Source: Steve Aldana)
47
Figure 2.6.17: PopUp15 in May 2017 (Source: Steve Aldana)
~~OP 15 
48
FRAMEWORK FOR NEW GREEN 
URBAN COMMONS
The Framework proposal that follows is intended to organize and facilitate 
the creation of new green urban commons (GUC’s) in San Diego’s Mid-City 
and Southeastern communities. As stated in the Introduction and Methods 
chapters, the Framework itself is a product of the synthesis of emergence 
theory with a distinct landscape type (iterative GUC’s) within the specific 
context of San Diego (reference Figure 1.13 for clarification). Because a primary 
research objective was to create a Framework for the development of GUC’s 
that embodies emergence theory, every e¥ort has been made to correlate 
Framework components and outcomes to Barnett’s emergent civic landscape 
criteria (see Figure 2.3.2). Information and experiences from PopUp15 action 
research helped to develop and hone certain aspects of the Framework and 
GUC Project Process detailed in the next section.
49
SPATIAL SCAFFOLD
- Designer Engagement
- Spatial Scaold Design
- Initial Landscape Construction
- Ongoing Iteration
ONGOING 
EVOLUTION & 
ITERATION
USER-BUILT 
LANDSCAPES WITH
PROFESSIONAL 
PARTNERSHIP
COLLECTIVELY  
MANAGED 
PUBLIC 
SPACE
FLEXIBLE AND
ADAPTIVE
URBAN 
ENVIRONMENTS
MATERIALS MENU
- Material Selection
- Territorialization and
De-Territorialization
SOCIAL STRUCTURE
- Site ID and Selection
- Stakeholder Mobilization
- Institutional Support
- Collaborative Design
- Green Urban Commons Management
FRAMEWORK
KEY COMPONENTS & VALUES
FR
AM
EW
OR
K V
ALU
ES
FR
AM
EW
OR
K C
OM
PO
NEN
TS
Figure 2.3.1: Framework Components and Values
50
INDIVIDUAL ‘PUBLIC SPACE 
PROTOTYPE’ PROJECT OUTCOMES
OUTCOME 1: 
Determine collective values and 
landscape objectives
OUTCOME 2: 
Define the relationships between social 
systems and ecosystems that will occur 
within the site (“the situation”)
OUTCOME 3: 
Negotiate parameters for same-level, 
bottom-up, and top-down influence over 
GUC management
OUTCOME 4:   
Determine physical organization of 
space that accommodates future 
adaptation and novel forms of 
occupation
OUTCOME 5: 
Assess and negotiate development 
regulations, code, and public safety 
requirements as they pertain to site
OUTCOME 6:   
Designer(s) and stakeholders collaborate 
on site design, program, and initial 
configuration of elements
OUTCOME 7:   
Teams of users and professionals 
construct spatial sca€old infrastructure 
and site amenities
OUTCOME 8:   
Internal democratic mechanisms in GUC 
management make value-based 
appraisals of landscape function, 
allocating resources and dictating 
changes to built infrastructure
OUTCOME 9:   
Resources are leveraged to continually 
iterate landscape elements in alignment 
with user needs
OUTCOME 10:   
New spatial use patterns emerge and are 
accommodated by adaptive 
management of GUC
SIX CHARACTERISTICS OF AN 
‘EMERGENT’ CIVIC LANDSCAPE
FRAMEWORK
COMPONENTS
An intentional link to social 
activity and novel forms of 
occupation
Explicit opportunities for the 
appearance of novel social 
properties 
Local control over local 
conditions
Consideration of same-level, 
top-down, and bottom-up 
influence
Defined relationshps between 
social systems and ecosystems
A commitment to pluralism 
(strong emergence)
MATERIAL
MENU
SPATIAL 
SCAFFOLD
SOCIAL 
STRUCTURE
Figure 2.3.2: Connections between emergence theory and proposed framework (A¦er Barnett 2013)
51
Site Identification and Selection
The development of a new GUC is most likely to begin 
with the identification of a vacant or underutilized lot by 
a community member, nonprofit organization, or activist 
designer. Currently in San Diego, the determination of 
land ownership, lot size, zoning, land use status, and 
other site characteristics require specialized knowledge 
or the use of GIS soœware. It is recommended that an 
online interface be created to expedite the identification 
city-owned vacant lots and facilitate communication 
between community members and potential 
stakeholders. Open source soœware called “Living Lots” 
exists for this exact purpose, having been made available 
through the nonprofit organization 596 Acres out of New 
York City. SanGIS shapefile data and metrics used by this 
project for case study site selection can be seamlessly 
integrated into such an online interface. An interactive 
online mapping tool could help community members 
and stakeholders not only identify physical spaces 
for GUC creation using the GIS data generated for this 
project, but it could also provide a web-based forum for 
community members to communicate with one another, 
share resources, and mobilize e¥orts around specific lot 
opportunities. 
Stakeholder Mobilization
Once a lot is identified, the next step is for stakeholders 
to find one another, organize, define collective values 
and objectives, and share resources. For purposes of the 
grassroots-led GUC e¥orts described by this Framework, 
a stakeholder can be defined as  “anyone who is 
potentially a¥ected by local, regional and global social 
issues whose needs could be addressed in the project, 
particularly marginalized groups” (Brown and Jennings, 
2003). A foremost concern for nascent stakeholder 
groups is to determine collective values and landscape 
objectives. This process of stakeholder-driven (rather 
than designer or government-driven) value negotiation 
regarding land use is an ongoing process in any GUC 
undertaking (Radywyl and Biggs, 2013).
Stakeholder groups may choose a number of methods 
to organize and share resources, though Asset-Based 
Community Development (ABCD) strategies can serve 
as an appropriate model. ABCD promotes a ‘glass half-
full’ approach to community development, focusing 
on the sharing and enhancement of assets rather than 
focusing on deficits. In addition to pooling resources, a 
Components
The Framework has three key components: “Social 
Structure” adaptive management strategies to 
encourage democratic management of space, a “Spatial 
Sca¥old” to guide the physical development of new 
GUC’s, and an adaptable and modular “Materials Menu” 
to accommodate various user-driven needs and activities 
(Figure 2.3.1). Combined together, the Social Structure, 
Materials Menu, and Spatial Sca¥old components 
of the Framework allow use patterns, activities, and 
physical configurations within appropriated vacant lots 
to fluctuate over time. In addition, each component of 
the Framework has an intentional link to one or more 
of Barnett’s six criteria for an emergent civic landscape 
(Figure 2.3.2). 
Embedded Framework Values
The Framework has four key values that should be 
communicated to stakeholders, city o¥icials, and all 
others who may be interested in developing GUC’s on 
city-owned vacant land in San Diego. These are meant to 
legibly convey to stakeholders the landscape values that 
can guide the development of new GUC’s that exhibit 
emergent characteristics, without necessarily naming or 
explaining the specific nuances of either. The values are:
• Urban environments should be flexible and 
adaptive
• Landscapes undergo constant evolution and 
iteration
• Civic landscapes should be built by end-users 
with professional partnership
• Public space should be collectively managed 
as a common-pool resource
SOCIAL STRUCTURE
The foremost component of the Framework is social 
management strategies to foster the initial development 
and ongoing maintenance of GUC’s. Although what 
follows is by no means an exhaustive inventory of social 
and political strategies necessary for GUC start-up and 
maintenance, the building blocks described are meant 
to inculcate stakeholders with tools to navigate the 
development of new landscapes on publicly owned land.
52
Figure 2.3.3: 
Construction 
during PopUP15 
Action Research
stakeholder group may also want to consider marketing 
and outreach tactics to build momentum around the 
project and connect with other interested parties. During 
the initial start-up phase of project development, any 
designers involved with the project will want to meet 
with these stakeholders to inform their decisions about 
Spatial Sca¥old design and future landscape possibilities.
Stewardship Team 
To maintain project oversight and continuity, it is 
recommended that a Stewardship Team be formed 
to lead project development and negotiate with both 
institutional and design partners. This team may consist 
of local residents, business owners, representatives 
from nonprofit organizations, faith groups, or other 
institutions that have some stake in the success of a 
particular GUC project. Transparency in decision-making 
and democratic negotiation of land use should remain 
paramount concerns. It is likely that this Stakeholder 
Team will be responsible for securing land use and 
construction approval from the city, delegating resources, 
and coordinating the purchase of materials. Mechanisms 
for decision-making and conflict resolution should be 
decided upon early in the project timeline.
Institutional Support 
Aœer initial mobilization and the definition of landscape 
objectives and collective values, a stakeholder group 
will want to initiate communication with the San Diego 
City agency or department responsible for overseeing 
the lot in question. Stakeholders will want to inquire 
about several things from their institutional contacts, 
including information about: formal approval for site 
access, physical development restrictions, construction 
permitting, as well as any liability issues or insurance 
requirements. At this point, the designer will also 
53
collaborate with the stakeholders and city agency to 
assess and negotiate development regulations, code, and 
public safety requirements as they pertain to the site in 
order to inform the Spatial Sca¥old design. Following the 
development of a Spatial Sca¥old design by a landscape 
architect or other professional, the Stewardship Team 
should remain in contact with their city agency about 
any major changes they intend to make to the GUC’s 
built infrastructure. Ostensibly, the city agency will have 
already recognized the fact that the physical landscape 
of the GUC is intended to shiœ and change over time. It 
would be best to clarify and negotiate early in the process 
the types of physical changes beyond initial Spatial 
Sca¥old construction that do and do not necessitate 
further institutional approval.
If the San Diego City Park and Recreation department or 
another agency responsible for public space oversight 
owns the identified GUC lot, the Stewardship Team may 
want to inquire about resource sharing and the iterative, 
collaborative development of a new public park. In this 
case, the city may be amenable to sharing financial, 
material, or maintenance resources. This type of 
collaborative development may be especially desirable 
for the city to test di¥erent public space prototype 
designs on city parks properties that present particularly 
problematic circumstances, such as the Martin Ave. Park 
site (discussed further in Assemblage Design Scenario 
secion) with its dramatically sloped topography and 
single family detached homes on either side. Such 
collaborative projects present opportunities for the Parks 
Department to create “safe to fail” public space projects 
at a lower cost and lower risk than more permanent, 
traditional park development.
In the case of a GUC on city parks-owned property, 
the Stewardship Team and involved designers will 
want to refer to guidelines found within the San Diego 
Parks and Recreation document Consultant’s Guide 
to Park Design and Development. Deviations from the 
parameters in this guide may be appropriate but would 
need to be negotiated with the city on a case-by-case 
basis. Another useful starting point for most groups 
embarking upon the development of a GUC, regardless 
of location, might be the San Diego Parks and Recreation 
guidelines and formal approval process for community 
garden development. The researcher recommends that 
the city create a similarly formalized “Placemaking” or 
“Green Urban Commons” approval process aligned with 
this Framework in order to lower barriers to new GUC 
creation.
Collaborative Design 
Aœer the determination of an initial Spatial Sca¥old 
and institutional approval, the Stakeholder Team will 
want to continue negotiating the program and activities 
set to occur within the landscape. This process began 
prior to the development of the Spatial Sca¥old during 
stakeholder mobilization, though it is probable that 
the stakeholder group will want to gain insight from a 
designer prior to passing judgment on initial land use 
patterns and the physical configuration of elements. 
During this stage of the project, the designer(s) may 
work with stakeholders to develop a more detailed plan 
for allocation of space within the Spatial Sca¥old.  The 
overarching 4’ grid geometry stipulated in the Spatial 
Sca¥old design guidelines will help stakeholders 
during this process of physical allocation. The designer 
should emphasize the adaptability of the Sca¥old to 
stakeholders, showing di¥erent ways that the space can 
evolve from the same starting point. The results of this 
negotiation process may take the form of something 
similar to the Assemblage Design Scenarios shown later 
in this document. 
The collaborative design process is likely to include 
continued negotiations about resource distribution and 
land use. For example, a particular stakeholder group 
may be interested in the development of skateboarding 
rails and ramps on a site. If no funds exist for the 
purchase of these materials, the Stewardship Team may 
stipulate that the area designated for the future skate 
park accommodate an interim programmatic element 
that is less expensive yet requires similar infrastructure 
(such as an asphalt basketball court).
Green Urban Commons Management 
The Stewardship Team should continue to hold regular, 
open meetings and invite additional community 
membership as it continues to oversee and democratically 
negotiate the use of space. The management structure 
should emphasize equitable access, equitable use, 
sustainable management of the space as a common pool 
resource, as well as equitable and transparent sharing of 
resources. Ongoing user-driven iteration of the physical 
environment will either reinforce or revise the physical 
54
Figure 2.3.4: Canyon-Adjacent Lot in Encanto
landscape that can continue to be flexible, adaptive, and 
accommodate future iteration.
Designer Engagement
A landscape architect or other design professional should 
become involved in a GUC project as soon as possible. 
Designer engagement in a user-driven GUC is likely to be 
on a voluntary, pro-bono basis, though certain project 
scales may necessitate some form of compensation 
and assumption of liability. The role of the designer is 
to explore the open systems that exert influence over a 
particular site and purposefully re-define (or reinforce) the 
relationships between social systems and ecosystems. 
It is understood, however, that a primary result of their 
involvement in the project will be a Spatial Sca¥old plan 
to help the stakeholder group secure approval from the 
city agencies responsible for overseeing the property in 
question. It is also understood that the four Framework 
values illustrated in Figure 2.2 will guide the designer’s 
decision-making toward a landscape design that 
embodies emergent characteristics.
In order to understand the connections and nuance of 
the systems exerting influence on a potential GUC site, 
designers will want to engage in “expressive drawing, 
writing, and photography” as well as site reconnaissance, 
site forensics, and a detailed a site survey (Barnett, 
2013). Site reconnaissance can be defined as exploration 
territory defined by initial construction. To continue the 
skate park/basketball illustration from the section above: 
when the skateboarding stakeholder group is able to 
garner funds for materials and construction, the territory 
designated for basketball would be renegotiated and the 
GUC would begin a new spatial iteration. If basketball 
were a particularly popular activity and paved asphalt 
space in the GUC were limited, the Stewardship Team or 
other management group might equitably negotiate and 
designate specific hours for basketball and skateboarding 
activities to alternate within the same space. These 
temporal guidelines could be communicated in creative 
ways such as decorative signage or artful timetable 
murals, and the physical fluctuation of space could be 
accommodated through innovative material use such 
as wheeled, moveable skate ramps. It is understood that 
each of these GUC management decisions would be 
made on a case-by-case basis yet strive to adhere to the 
overarching Framework Values (ref. Figure 3.2).
SPATIAL SCAFFOLD
The purpose of the Spatial Sca¥old is to guide the 
physical development of a new or established GUC. 
Aligned with the emergentist notion that all landscape 
situations are in a continual process of “becoming,” 
the Spatial Sca¥old sets the initial conditions for a 
55
of a territory in order to gain information, whereas 
site forensics refer to the use of deductive scientific 
thought to build evidence in support of an argument or 
understanding of reality. A site survey is recognized as 
the two-dimensional definition and communication of a 
physical territory as well as the “determination of cultural 
details above, on, or beneath the surface of the earth” 
(Barnett, 2013). It is recommended that the designer, in 
light of both the Framework values and those established 
by the GUC stakeholder group, document what they 
perceive to be the key opportunities and constraints for a 
particular site’s development. In addition to documenting 
the sociocultural and biophysical factors at play on a 
potential GUC site, the designer will also want to conduct 
soil toxicity tests and any other documentation required 
to ensure public safety.
It is unlikely that a grassroots-led GUC project will have 
funds to hire a professional survey team or other similar 
consultation services. As a result, the designer is likely to 
use several rudimentary tools in order to establish the 
site survey, and guide site reconnaissance and forensics: 
Google Earth imagery, LIDAR topographic information, 
SanGIS data, and on-site measurements. The designer 
should also undertake, on their own volition, whatever 
exploratory means they deem appropriate in order to 
understand the forces at play on the site. 
Another important aspect of designer engagement with a 
GUC project is their role in initial stakeholder mobilization. 
It is likely that the designer will want to reach out to 
individuals, nonprofits, or community groups that have 
either directly expressed interest in participating, or are 
likely to participate in GUC construction and use. The 
designer should ask questions regarding the activities 
that stakeholders would like to conduct within the space, 
as well as the physical requirements for the activities. 
Although it is important that the designer interview 
potential and active stakeholders regarding specific GUC 
use, ether Stewardship Team or other leadership should 
be the ones leading outreach e¥orts. It is important 
to keep in mind that the designer’s involvement in the 
project is temporary or intermittent at best, and that it 
will be the responsibility of GUC leadership to identify 
and follow up with parties for outreach.
Spatial Sca¡old Design
In partnership with a landscape architect working on a 
pro-bono basis, stakeholder groups should develop a 
schematic physical plan to gain city approval and guide 
both initial construction and ongoing evolution of the 
GUC. Following their initial site reconnaissance and 
creative forensics process, designers should use physical 
elements selected from the Materials Menu (presented 
later in this chapter) to propose: 
• Basic access and egress to the site
• Internal circulation pathways between 
landscape spaces, preferably at or under 5%
• Defined green spaces that have either distinct 
or flexible uses
• Flexible, programmable social spaces that are 
leveled at or under a 2% cross slope. These 
spaces should be designed and drawn with a 4’ 
grid.
• Infrastructural spaces (ex. restrooms and trash 
receptacles)
• Integral systems such as electrical and 
irrigation
The spatial sca¥old design should be communicated 
to stakeholders and institutional contacts with a scaled 
plan drawing that includes the basic delineation of green 
space areas, programmable social spaces, key spot 
elevations, modified contours, and existing vegetation to 
retain. The overarching 4’ grid geometry for flat-graded 
programmable landscape spaces is helpful because it 
is both an acceptable minimum pathway dimension as 
well as the unit by which many landscape elements in 
the Materials Menu can be permutated (pallets, shipping 
containers, planter beds, sca¥olding, etc.). With a clear 
4’ grid, stakeholders can use the designer’s initial spatial 
sca¥old drawings at a later date to quickly calculate 
square foot areas and negotiate use of space.
Landscape designers should remain mindful of the four 
Framework values while designing, acknowledging 
the fact that although they are responsible for defining 
certain relationships between physical spaces, end-users 
of the space are the ones responsible for use patterns, 
program, and the way the landscape is occupied. An 
additional consideration during spatial sca¥old design 
is adherence to ADA and public safety codes in order to 
ensure equitable access. Although certain materials may 
be called out, the designer may choose to be non-specific 
56
about initial material selection. Although materials 
may vary, the construction of designed Spatial Sca¥old 
elements should allow for the space to assume minimal 
function and permit full public access to the new GUC.
Initial Landscape Construction
Following spatial sca¥old design and institutional 
approval, initial construction of the GUC may begin. 
Although non-experts can assemble most elements 
in the Materials Menu, stakeholders may need to 
collaborate with professional consultants when 
constructing Spatial Sca¥old components and other 
infrastructure mandated through the city approval and 
permitting process. This may include electrical work, 
grading, construction of overhead structures, and other 
specialized tasks. Despite the likely need for some 
professional assistance, GUC stakeholder groups should 
strive to construct as many of the planned site amenities 
and Spatial Sca¥old components as possible. Volunteer 
work parties or regular volunteer construction hours will 
save on labor costs as well as encourage community 
investment in the space. Stakeholder groups may want 
to host kick-o¥ events to build interest in the project and 
garner additional volunteers. Furthermore, stakeholders 
may be able to secure pro-bono volunteer support from 
construction companies, faith groups, and San Diego 
high school students required to complete community 
service hours for graduation. Outreach to these and 
similar groups is encouraged.
Ongoing Iteration
The Spatial Sca¥old design is meant to guide the physical 
evolution of a GUC space as social capital and activities 
fluctuate over time. Stakeholders should continue 
to transparently manage the GUC as a common pool 
community resource, allowing parties interested in using 
the space to become more or less involved in the project. 
In addition to flexibility in leadership and stakeholder 
involvement, oversight and GUC management should 
allow new programmatic uses and spatial configurations 
to emerge. As user participation changes over time, 
the territory defined by initial construction will either 
be reinforced or revised as emergent use patterns 
and stakeholder desires exert influence on the GUC’s 
physical landscape trajectory. If, for example, a group 
of community gardeners loses interest or momentum, 
the space and vegetable beds may be appropriated as a 
planting area for orchard trees. Conversely, a temporary 
stage made of sca¥olding within a plaza may become 
a more permanent wooden fixture with an overhead 
lattice, or an aluminum access ramp may be loaned to 
another GUC it is replaced by a concrete walkway. Most 
important to the success of the GUC is the ongoing value-
based negotiation among stakeholders about space 
use and landscape change. So long as the “bones” of 
the Spatial Sca¥old are upheld, basic public access and 
safety standards will be maintained within the GUC as 
the space undergoes continued iteration.
MATERIALS MENU
The purpose of the Materials Menu is to support the 
initial construction of Spatial Sca¥old elements as 
well as the ongoing iteration of a GUC. As various user 
desires and landscape activities are negotiated, the 
suite of elements described in this section can be used 
to translate stakeholder ideas into basic public space 
prototypes. As time progresses and space is negotiated, 
these initial prototypes become more or less definite 
through an ongoing process of territorialization and 
deterritorialization.
Material Selection
The following information sheets provide a kit-of-parts 
of temporary landscape elements that can be deployed 
to fulfill desired functions. Materials have been selected 
primarily because they are both inexpensive and possess 
modular, adaptive, or multi-functional qualities. This list 
is not meant to be exhaustive, but rather to reveal a range 
of landscape possibilities using a restrained palette of 
temporary landscape elements that can be used in the 
initial territorialization of a GUC landscape assemblage.
Territorialization and Deterritorialization
For purposes of the Framework and materials palette, 
territorialization and deterritorialization provide a strong 
operative metaphor for envisioning how a physical GUC 
space might change, develop, and evolve into the future. 
The terms “territorialization” and “deterritorialization” 
refer to spatial and temporal aspects of the assemblage 
concept. As the various content (bodies and actions) 
and expression (signs, symbols, and “incorporeal 
transformations attributed to bodies”) of an assemblage 
interact, physical elements and objects in the landscape 
become more or less definite (Deleuze and Guattari 1987). 
A dammed reservoir, for example, is an example of an 
57
assemblage with a territory that is physically reinforced 
by cultural desire. The reservoir has clear causal 
relationships with its immediate surroundings and the 
lands downstream that are either irrigated or protected 
from flood (other territories and assemblages in which 
the reservoir plays a role). The reservoir assemblage 
may be subject to forms of disturbance such as erosion 
or an earthquake that would cause its dam to fail. In the 
event of such a failure, one could call the disturbance 
one of the “cutting edges” of deterritorialization. De-
territorialization of the reservoir would occur as its 
physical boundaries and characteristics are drastically 
revised, and destructive floodwaters would just as 
dramatically alter (deterritorialize) the downstream 
territories. Whole patterns of use and functioning 
surrounding the drained reservoir would change, and 
new functions would materialize around the reservoir 
and in the territories below.
Disturbance and reinforcement along the 
territorialization—deterritorialization axis oœen occurs 
at a much less dramatic scale than that of a catastrophic 
dam failure. In fact, Deleuze and Guattari would 
posit that the mechanisms of territorialization and 
deterritorialization are embedded and continuous in 
any situation—at the microscopic level as well as at the 
macroscopic (1987). Landscapes and other situations 
can be described as always becoming and never static 
or twice the same.  Over time, users of new GUCs will 
begin to replace temporary landscape elements with 
more fixed materials. Extraneous landscape elements 
can be reassembled and reconfigured to meet relevant 
new desires, and resources can be leveraged by the 
GUC Stewardship Team to continually iterate landscape 
elements in alignment with user needs.
Figure 2.3.5: Vacant Lot near Euclid Ave. and Market Street
58
Modular Size, can be found for free, 
liœed and moved easily. Fits within 
4’x4’ spatial sca¥old grid
Base for site furnishings and 
planters
Pallets may be pried apart and used 
for raw building material, though 
the inexpensive timber oœen 
splinters and splits easily.
2-3 Years contingent upon weather 
and moisture
Free (Used) - $20-$25 (New)
Standard North American 
GMA Pallet: 48” Stringers, 40” 
Deckboards
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Wooden Pallet
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.5: À nous le parking  (Source: Collectif-Etc)
Figure 2.3.6: Bodø Harbour Square Installation 
(Source: Svein Erik Toien)
Figure 2.3.7: Repurposed Pallets (Source: Makers Quarter San Diego) Figure 2.3.8: Pallet Basket Planters 
59
This readily available material 
may be diverted from the urban 
wastestream. Heavy pieces can 
be used in place of large stones to 
serve a variety of functions
Decorative paving, stacked walls, fill 
for gabions
Use caution when using broken 
concrete reinforced with welded 
wire. Be judicious with shape 
selection. Plaza areas using 
repurposed concrete may have 
di¥iculty complying with ADA
> 5 Years
Free + Delivery
Varied, though consideration 
should be given to whether pieces 
will be hand-liœed (12”x18”x4” 
recommended max) or moved with 
equipment
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Repurposed Concrete
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.9: Concrete Pavers at Urban Outfitters HQ
Figure 2.3.10: Recycled Concrete Wall  (Source: gardendrum.com)
Figure 2.3.11: Saw-Cut Sidewalk Reuse  (Source: Rios Clementi Hale) Figure 2.3.12: Concrete Pavers at Urban Outfitters HQ
60
Easily obtained, inexpensive 
material suitable for initial 
furnishing prototypes. Modular 
furnishing units can stand alone 
or be used in innumerable 
configurations 
Site furnishings such as benches, 
tables, chairs, caps for gabion seat 
walls, decks and stages 
Stakeholder-constructed 
furnishings may reflect the 
character of a landscape or 
community. Plywood may 
be doubled-up or joined for 
strength. Sun and water will speed 
deterioration of unfinished wood
1-5 Years depending upon material 
finish, construction, and moisture 
exposure
Varied
 Dimensional Lumber: 4x4, 2x4, 
2x2 (Nominal) @ 6’-12’ Lengths; 
Plywood: 4’x8’ sheets at 3/4” thick
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Dimensional Lumber & Plywood
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.14: Plywood Seating, Lentspace  (Source: Interboro Partners)
Figure 2.3.15: Planters and Seating at Lentspace (Interboro Partners)
Figure 2.3.16: Stage & Seating, Le Brasero (Source: BruitduFrigo.com) Figure 2.3.17: Teatro del Mare Seating (Source: ConstructLab/exyzt)
61
Modular size, can be configured and 
interlocked in various positions. 
Diverse range of applications.
May be dry-stacked for low retaning 
walls or used as steps. May be 
up-ended and used with lumber to 
form a crude bench
Weak without concrete filling and 
rebar reinforcement
> 5 Years
$1.50/ea
8x8x16 Nominal (7 5/8”x7 5/8”x15 
5/8” Actual)
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Cinder Block
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.18: 8x8x16 CMU Block  (Source: RCP Block and Brick)
Fig. 2.3.19: Dry-Stacked CMU Wall (Source: ultimate-handyman.com)
Figure 2.3.20: Creative CMU Planter Wall (Source: Zack Benson) Figure 2.3.21: CMU Steps  (Source: theFigure5.wordpress.com)
62
Can be assembled on-site and filled 
with found/repurposed materials. 
More adaptable and temporary 
than concrete or CMU retaining 
walls. Wide enough to serve as seat 
walls
May be used as retaining wall 
structures and seat walls
Do not use round cobbles in 
gabions. Use rough interlocking 
stones or concrete rubble.
> 5 Years with proper maintenance
Approx $35/ea
3’x3’x3’
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Gabion Basket
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.22: Gabion retaining wall
Figure 2.3.23: Bench cap on gabion seat wall Figure 2.3.24: Decorative gabion wall
63
Easily obtained, modular materials 
than can be easily disassembled 
and repurposed.
May be used as overhead shade 
structure, or trellis as well as for 
fencing
Temporary fencing may be 
used initially, replaced in a later 
iteration with concrete-embedded 
fenceposts
> 5 Years with proper maintenance
$6 - $10 per linear foot
6’ - 8’ High, 8’ span between posts
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Chain Link Fencing 
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.25: Temporary chain link fence
Figure 2.3.26: Chain Link Fence Materials  (Source: Mutual Industries) Figure 2.3.27: Chain link trellis and partition (Src: Interboro Partners)
64
Can be less expensive than asphalt 
and paving alternatives. Semi-
permeable. Can be stockpiled and 
used to level out uneven surfaces
Ground plane for sloped walkways 
and flat-graded programmable 
areas. Can be made ADA Accessible
Use stabilized mix and install 
in liœs. Compact and wet liœs 
during installation. Install extra 
thickness for vehicle areas, and use 
compacted gravel subgrade.
Replenish and compact every 3-4 
years
$30 - $35 per cubic yard
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Decomposed Granite
Cost
Figure 2.3.28: Decomposed Granite  (Source: Soils Plus)
Figure 2.3.29: DG at SILO Maker’s Quarter, San Diego 
Figure 2.3.30: Decomposed Granite Ramp
65
Uniform size, inexpensive and 
easy to replace during prototype 
iterations
Used as ground plane for flat-
graded programmable areas
May be painted or stenciled with a 
decorative pattern by volunteers. 
Be sure to use edge restraint system 
and sweep sand joints
4-5 years before re-set or 
replacement/repair
$1/ea
12”x12”x1.5”
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Concrete Pavers
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.31: Modular pavers at PopUp15
Figure 2.3.32: Modular concrete paver  (Source: Home Depot) Figure 2.3.33: Modular concrete paver  (Source: Home Depot)
66
Biodegradable and easily removed. 
Can be secured from local tree 
trimmers on a free/donation basis.
Used as mulch or for pathways/
trails through green space and 
planting areas
Various grades exist. Pine wood 
chips are best, eucalyptus is 
appropriate for paths, no-cost 
Miramar landfill compost can be 
used to enrich soil in planting areas
1-2 years before replenishment 
necessary
Free - $12 per cubic yard
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Wood Mulch
Cost
Figure 2.3.34: Coarse pine wood chips
Figure 2.3.35: Wood chip Pathways Figure 2.3.36: Wood chips 4” thick over asphalt pavement
67
Provides a relatively inexpensive, 
flat and ADA compliant ground 
plane for open programmable 
social space
Ground plane for flat-graded 
programmable areas
Professional installation necessary. 
May be painted annually with 
murals or other markings
Re-seal every 3-5 years
$3 - $4 per sq. œ.
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Asphalt
Cost
Figure 2.3.37: Murals painted on asphalt  (Source: M.Fischetti)
Figure 2.3.38: Swap meet on asphalt  (Source: 1.bp.blogspot.com) Figure 2.3.39: Asphalt at Quartyard San Diego
68
Versatile, multi-use material that 
can be stockpiled on-site. Easily 
removed from ground plane and  
re-used as construction sub-base
Construction subbase, larger grade 
for vehicle parking areas
Ensure liœs are wetted during 
installation and compaction.
$25 - $35 per cubic yard
3/4” minus size for construction 
purposes. 3” for vehicular areas
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Gravel
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.40: Crushed #3 Gravel (Source: Gernatt Asphalt Products)
Figure 2.3.41: 3/4” Gravel  (Source: RCP Block and Brick)
Figure 2.3.42: 3/4” Gravel Road Base  (Source: Rhodehouse Construction)
69
> 5 YearsLife Cycle
Edging curbs may be used to 
delineate boundaries set in spatial 
sca¥old, can provide a retaining 
edge for initial materials as well as 
later, more refined material
Plaza edge curbs delineate plaza 
areas and retain either DG or unit 
pavers. Poured concrete may be 
suitable for access ramps steeper 
than 5%
Use simple formwork, can be 
manually mixed
Varied
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Poured Concrete
Cost
Figure 2.3.43: Concrete curb (Source: External Works)
Figure 2.3.44: Poured curb edger  (Source: ArchiExpo) Figure 2.3.45: Concrete Edging  (Source: DIY Advice)
70
Easily obtained and constructed, 
provides a small footprint for larger, 
removable structures
Can be used to construct a 4’x4’ 
grid of in-plaza sleeves to support 
modular structures.
Forms have poor structural integrity 
when cut or exposed to moisture.
> 5 Years aœer pour
$8/ea
9.5” diam x 4’ length
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Concrete Footing - Tube Formed
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.46: 4’ x 10” Diam. Footing Form (Source: Lowes)
Figure 2.3.47: Footing Form (Source: Lowes) Figure 2.3.48: Footing and Bracket (Source: Quikrete)
71
Readily available and easy to 
purchase or rent. Simple to 
assemble with modular sets 
of hardware. Large array of 
configurations with understood, 
city-approved construction codes
Overhead shade structures, stages, 
guardrails
Consult local building code and 
adhere to safety standards.
> 5 Years, Removable
Varied
Varied bay widths (6’ to 8’ max.) and 
heights.
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Sca¡olding
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.49: Sca’olding
Figure 2.3.50: Sca’olding Fittings
Figure 2.3.51: Sca’old shade and platform at the lido by EXYZT  (Source: David Carr-Smith)
72
May be easily transported to and 
from a site, can be loaned out by 
the city and re-used on multiple 
GUC sites during prototyping and 
iteration
ADA access for grades steeper than 
5% and up to 8%
Use 4’ wide modular spans of 
ramp in combination with pieces 
at Prefab Aluminum Ramps 30, 
60, 90, and 45 degree angles. Use 
in combination with tube-formed 
concrete footings
> 5 Years, Removable
Approx $100 - $125 per foot, 
depending upon application
4’ - 6’ width, 30’ max span between 
landings
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Prefabricated Aluminum Ramps
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.54: ADA-Compliant Alum. Ramp (Source: G&A Manufact.)
Figure 2.3.53: Aluminum walkway (Source: Discount Ramps)
Figure 2.3.52: Angled aluminum walkway (Source: Discount Ramps)
73
May be easily transported to and 
from a site. Modular size
May be used for storage, 
concession/co¥ee stands, and base 
for additional structures
Install ventilation on larger 
containers. Reinforce all cut 
containers with tube steel and 
ensure adherence to local building 
codes
> 5 Years, Removable
$2500 - $1500
8’ wide x 10’ high x 40’, 20’, or 10’ 
length
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Steel Shipping Containers
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.55: Unmodified 40-foot container
Figure 2.3.56: Co’ee shop container conversion - sliding door Figure 2.3.57: Restaurant container conversion - hinged service window
74
Versatile material that may be 
used in a variety of decorative and 
structural configurations
Trellis structures, stakes for gabion 
and paver edge restraints, concrete 
reinforcement
Pieces may be welded together or 
painted
Varies, Approx $0.50 per œ.
3/8”, 1/2” diam come in 0.5’ - 20’ 
Lengths
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Rebar
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.58: Rebar arbor  (Source: Gardening From the Ground Up)
Figure 2.3.59: Rebar stake  (Source: ePlaya) Figure 2.3.60: Welded wire and rebar trellis (Source: Shaun’s Backyard)
75
May be unstacked and re-used 
elsewhere
Low dry-stacked retaining wall
Use care when stacking to ensure 
proper lock. Do not exceed 
recommended heights. Compacted 
gravel footing may decrease settling
> 5 Years, Removable
$565 per palette (at 144 units per)
6”x16”x9” unit, 36” max wall ht.
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Keystone Blocks
Cost
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.61: Keystone unit  (Source: RCP Block)
Figure 2.3.62: Keystone retaining wall  (Source: RCP Block)
Figure 2.3.63: Keystone wall detail  (Source: Davis Colors) Figure 2.3.64: Keystone wall (Source: Firth)
76
Shade is necessary for protection 
from the warm Southern California 
sun, and sails are easily moved 
around a site to determine ideal 
configuration
May be fixed to galvanized pipe in 
custom plaza sleeve or to concrete 
tire bracket.
Sails come in a diverse array of sizes 
and may be purchased online.
2-3 Years contingent upon weather 
and length of exposure
$80/ea
12’x8’ Rectangle, 12’x12’x17’ 
Triangle
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Life Cycle
Shade Sails
Cost
Dimensions
Fig. 2.3.65: Shade Sail over playground  (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Figure 2.3.66: Concrete tire supports for shade sails Figure 2.3.67: Rectangular shade sail  (Source: Shade Industries)
77
Can be moved around
Childrens’ activities, entertainment
Games and other activities enhance 
user experience at parks and during 
events
Varies, though 4’x4’ grid may be 
used to approximate dimensions
Adaptive 
Qualities
Uses
Details
Games & Play
Dimensions
Figure 2.3.68: Bag toss at Quartyard San Diego
Figure 2.3.69: Large games at the Oval in PHL (Source: M.Fischetti)
Figure 2.3.70: Sandbox at Brut du Frigo (Source: BruitduFrigo.com)
Figure 2.3.71: Giant Jenga at Quartyard San Diego Fig. 2.3.72: Modular plastic play equipment (Source: Richard Dattner)
78
The project process diagram (Figure 2.4.1) and three phase descriptions that 
follow illustrate how the various Framework building blocks interact and 
intersect over the lifespan of a GUC project. Since the Framework is concerned 
primarily with project initiation and initial physical design, more specific 
outcomes and actions are defined in phases one and two. This emphasis 
sets the stage for ongoing emergent use patterns in phase three. The third 
phase guides the ongoing physical evolution of an individual GUC based 
upon democratic community management and the assemblage concept of 
territorialization.
GREEN URBAN COMMONS 
PROJECT PROCESS
79
GREEN URBAN 
COMMONS 
MANAGEMENT
COLLABORATIVE 
NEGOTIATION
INSTITUTIONAL 
SUPPORT
INITIAL 
LANDSCAPE 
CONSTRUCTION
ONGOING 
ITERATION
COLLABORATIVE 
DESIGN
MATERIAL
SELECTION
SITE ID & 
SELECTION
DESIGNER 
ENGAGEMENT
STAKEHOLDER 
MOBILIZATION
SPATIAL 
SCAFFOLD 
DESIGN
PHASE 1: 
PROJECT START-UP
PHASE 2: 
INITIAL DEVELOPMENT
PHASE 3: 
ONGOING MANAGEMENT
TERRITORIAL-
IZATION
DE-TERRITORI-
ALIZATION
 
 
- Specific vacant lot selected
- Stakeholder team formed
- Management plan 
   determined
- Momentum-building and 
   resource-sharing begin
- Initial ‘spatial scaold’ 
   design approved by city
 
 
- Site access granted by city
- Participatory, collaborative 
   design process continues to 
   inform specific site design
- Base infrastructure, ‘spatial 
   scaold’, and initial 
   amenities are constructed
- Lot opens to the public
 
 
- Iterative experimentation 
   continues within new space
- Institutional support continues 
   along with incremental 
   user-driven change
- Project evolves, becoming 
   more physically ‘fixed’ or 
   abandoned over time
Figure 2.4.1: GUC Project Process Diagram
80
Phase 1: Project Start-Up
In phase one an individual, organization, or team of stakeholders selects a 
specific vacant lot for GUC development. This team determines a management 
plan and decision-making structure for future internal and external 
negotiations. Stakeholders base their decisions about GUC development on 
a set of collectively determined values and landscape objectives. Momentum 
building and resource-sharing begin as the stakeholders mobilize to achieve 
their landscape objectives. The stakeholder group collaborates with a 
landscape architect or design professional on an initial Spatial Sca¥old design 
that can accommodate future adaptation and novel forms of occupation. 
The Spatial Sca¥old plan is then approved by the City agency responsible for 
overseeing the property, assessing the GUC proposal in light of development 
regulations, code, and public safety requirements.
81
OUTCOME 3: 
Negotiate parameters for 
same-level, bottom-up, and 
top-down influence over GUC 
management
OUTCOME 2: 
Define the relationships 
between social systems and 
ecosystems that will occur 
within the site (“the 
situation”) OUTCOME 5: 
Assess and negotiate 
development regulations, code, 
and public safety requirements 
as they pertain to site
STAKEHOLDER 
MOBILIZATION
- Map and share resources through 
Asset-Based Community Development
- Form a Stewardship Team and 
decision-making structure
- Conduct community outreach to 
promote project, build 
momentum, and garner 
support
INSTITUTIONAL 
SUPPORT
- Communicate with govt. 
agencies to formally secure 
site access & physical 
development approval
- Determine liability & 
insurance req’s
DESIGNER 
ENGAGEMENT
- Designer: conduct and 
share site survey, creative 
reconnaissance, and site 
forensics
SPATIAL 
SCAFFOLD DESIGN
- Develop a schematic 
physical plan to gain city 
approval and guide both 
initial construction and 
ongoing evolution of the 
Green Urban Commons
SITE ID & 
SELECTION
- Use online interface to 
identify city-owned vacant 
lots, connect with other 
interested parties, and 
initiate a project
PHASE 1: 
PROJECT START-UP
RECOMMENDED ACTIONS & OUTCOMES
PHASE 2: 
INITIAL DEVELOPMENT
OUTCOME 4:   
Determine physical organization 
of space that accommodates 
future adaptation and novel 
forms of occupation
OUTCOME 1: 
Determine 
collective values 
and landscape 
objectives
Figure 2.4.2: GUC Project Process Phase 1
82
Phase 2: Initial Development
Phase two begins when initial site access and construction permissions 
have been granted by the City agencies responsible for overseeing the GUC 
property. Participatory, collaborative design processes among stakeholders 
and the design team continue to inform specific decisions about which initial 
landscape amenities are constructed. Teams of users and professionals 
construct base infrastructure and Spatial Sca¥old circulation paths, and the 
lot opens to the public.
83
MATERIAL 
SELECTION
- Select temporary landscape 
elements to fulfill desired 
functions
- Negotiate the sharing of 
resources
- Coordinate the purchase of 
materials
COLLABORATIVE 
DESIGN
- Negotiate physical use of the new 
Green Urban Commons with 
Stewardship Team and interested 
stakeholders
- Determine initial program and 
activities
INITIAL LANDSCAPE 
CONSTRUCTION
- Collaborate with professional 
consultants to construct specialized 
spatial scaold components and 
basic infrastructure 
- Hold volunteer work parties to 
construct site elements
- Initiate public access and host kick-o 
events to build interest
-  Conduct regular Stewardship Team 
meetings and invite additional 
community membership
PHASE 3: 
ONGOING MANAGEMENT
OUTCOME 6:   
Designer(s) and stakeholders 
collaborate on site design, program, 
and initial configuration of elements
OUTCOME 7:   
Teams of users and professionals 
construct spatial scaold 
infrastructure and site amenities
PHASE 2: 
INITIAL DEVELOPMENT
RECOMMENDED ACTIONS & OUTCOMES
Figure 2.4.3: GUC Project Process Phase 2
84
Phase 3: Ongoing Management
Following initial construction of the Spatial Sca¥old, iterative experimentation 
continues within defined landscape spaces. Internal democratic mechanisms 
in GUC management make value-based appraisals of landscape function, 
allocating resources and dictating changes to built infrastructure. Institutional 
support continues along with incremental user-driven change, and the 
stakeholder/Stewardship Team stays in communication with the city about 
major structural changes to the site that might need additional oversight or 
approval. The physical territory of the GUC evolves to form any number of 
possible landscape assemblages, falling on a spectrum from becoming more 
physically ‘fixed’ to being totally abandoned. 
85
OUTCOME 8:   
Internal democratic mechanisms 
in GUC management make 
value-based appraisals of 
landscape function, allocating 
resources and dictating changes 
to built infrastructure
OUTCOME 10:   
New spatial use patterns emerge 
and are accommodated by 
adaptive management of GUC
OUTCOME 9:   
Resources are leveraged to 
continually iterate landscape 
elements in alignment with 
user needs
ONGOING
ITERATION
- Continue to transparently manage GUC as a 
common pool community resource
- Either reinforce or revise the physical 
territory defined by initial construction
GREEN URBAN 
COMMONS 
MANAGEMENT
Stewardship Team continues to 
oversee and negotiate the 
equitable use of space
TERRITORI-
ALIZATION
Over time, replace  
temporary landscape 
elements with more 
permanent materials 
DE-TERRITO-
RIALIZATION
Disassemble and 
reconfigure extraneous 
landscape elements 
to meet 
relevant desires
((FUTURE LANDSCAPE ASSEMBLAGES))
Emergent use patterns and stakeholder desires within 
GUC exert influence on physical landscape trajectory
PHASE 3: 
ONGOING MANAGEMENT
RECOMMENDED ACTIONS & OUTCOMES
Figure 2.4.4: GUC Project Process Phase 3
86
Site Selection
According to the 2016 SanGIS land use map, the overall study area contains 333 
total acres of vacant land, 34 acres of which is owned by the City of San Diego 
across 104 lots (SanGIS, 2016). Time and research constraints prohibited the 
generation of GUC proposals for each of these 104 lots, so a series of additional 
maps were created and GIS analyses conducted to identify potential sites for 
GUC design and Framework development.
Prior to the identification of additional sample sites, the researcher had 
partnered with a group of stakeholders to develop schematic design proposals 
for a city-owned vacant lot in the City Heights community over summer 2016 
(further detailed in the Pilot Project section earlier in this document). This 
site will hereaœer be called “PopUp15,” the name given to the GUC by the 
Boulevard BIA. An intentional e¥ort was made to identify two additional case 
study sites that would be of a di¥erent character, context, and emergent use 
pattern than the PopUp15 site.
The decision to prioritize publicly owned vacant lots was based on literature 
that stated they are “more appropriate for temporary use” than privately 
owned lots. In addition to this recommendation, Nemeth and Langhorst 
provide additional criteria for land selection, namely favoring sites of low 
private development interest, leœover/remnant parcels, and long vacancy 
duration. They also make the recommendation to avoid “‘underutilized land’ 
(awaiting planned development)” and recently vacant land that is likely to 
develop quickly (2013). These recommendations provided the basis for an 
analysis of SanGIS land cover data that revealed the vacancy duration of 
specific tax lot parcels in 4 and 6-year increments back to 1986. Based upon 
public ownership, lot size, and the duration of vacancy alone, the researcher 
identified sites that could be characterized as “leœover/remnant parcels” and 
“small, fragmented spaces” suitable for temporary land use (Nemeth and 
Langhorst,   2013).
Access to green public space is a key consideration for public health in urban 
environments. To this end, an additional series of maps were generated 
to identify public space deficits in the study area and Promise Zone. Radial 
bu¥ers of 1/8 and 1/4 mile were drawn outward from the border of existing 
parks, and the researcher used this map to identify spatial gaps in what can 
be considered acceptable walking distance to green open space. Site visits to 
SITE SELECTION AND 
EXISTING CONDITIONS
87
Figure 2.5.1: City-owned vacant lot in the Valencia Park neighborhood of Encanto
88
individual vacant lots were prioritized, in part, by whether 
or not a vacant lot fell outside of this bu¥er.
Following GIS mapping and analysis, the researcher’s 
existing knowledge of study area context was used to 
select sites that merited a field visit. Particular attention 
was paid to currently undeveloped properties slated to 
become city parks, as these spaces have high potential 
to serve as a forum for iterative and user-driven ‘public 
space prototype’ GUC’s. Field visits were conducted to 
18 total city-owned vacant lots in the study area over 
several days in winter 2017, 8 of which were documented 
in detail. Two of these lots, hereaœer called “Market 
Street Hillside” and “Martin Avenue Park,” were ultimately 
selected for design exploration. These lots were selected 
primarily based upon their adherence to Nemeth and 
Langhorst’s “conditions appropriate for temporary use,” 
as well as the researcher’s knowledge of context and on-
site observation of conditions conducive to public access 
and user-driven site development (2013). Selection 
criteria for each site and their “fitness” for temporary land 
use and GUC creation are detailed further in Figure 2.5.2.
Although SanGIS data provided extensive criteria for site 
identification and selection, there are distinct limitations 
associated with the mapping process. The most 
significant limitation is that by operating at the grain of 
individual tax lot parcels, the mapping process does not 
specifically identify remnant lands or wasteland spaces 
oœen characterized as “interstitial spaces” or “terrain 
vague” (Mubi Brighenti, 2013; Solà-Morales, 2014). Many 
of these spaces, while occurring at a grain other than that 
of a tax lot, could provide spaces that are just as fruitful for 
the development of GUC’s. Along the same lines, not all 
city-owned vacant lots are suitable for GUC development, 
nor are all potentially suitable sites for GUC listed under 
the land use classification “Vacant & Undeveloped”. No 
hard and fast rules for site identification are laid out 
in the proposed Framework for GUC development, as 
opportunities for GUC development are most likely to 
emanate from the daily experience and individual needs 
of stakeholder groups rather than GIS mapping activities.
Existing Site Conditions 
The following maps and site photographs depict existing 
conditions and historic information for each of the three 
sites selected for GUC development. These analysis 
maps depict physical characteristics such as topography, 
existing vegetation and adjacent properties as well as 
social use patterns that were observed. 
Assemblage Collages
In light of their selection for GUC development and 
the six characteristics of emergent civic landscape 
described by Barnett, multimedia collage were created 
to explore and express each site as an “assemblage,” 
defined as: “objects, bodies, expressions, qualities, and 
territories that come together for varying periods of 
time, ideally to create new ways of functioning” (Deleuze 
and Guattari, 1987). Any landscape can be understood 
as an assemblage. The physical and cultural notions 
underlying urban territories fold, overlap, and shiœ like 
cloth in motion; always becoming and never twice the 
same. Viewed as a rich constellation of intersecting social 
and material elements, derelict urban spaces can be 
seen for what they are as well as for what they could be. 
The assemblage collages included for each site express 
the researcher’s perception of the spaces as they exist 
and for how they might change.
89
Figure 2.5.2: Comparative Lot Table
POPUP15 MARTIN AVE PARK MARKET STREET HILLSIDE
Size 0.27 Acres 0.15 Acres 1.15 Acres
Ownership San Diego City Development Services San Diego Parks & Recreation San Diego City
Community Plan 
Area
City Heights (Mid-City) Southeastern Encanto
Neighborhood Teralta West Mountain View Chollas View
Within Federal
Promise Zone
No Yes Yes
Within Renewal 
Community
No Yes Yes
Within BIA Yes (Boulevard BIA) No Yes (Diamond BIA)
Distance from 
Developed Park
>1/8 Mile >1/4 Mile >1/4 Mile
Vacancy Duration 26-30 Years 21-26 Years 16-21 Years
Characteristics
Active team of nonprofit stakeholders 
and preliminary funding/revenue 
sources secured. Located on a flat site 
along a busy commercial corridor
Slated to become neighborhood mini 
park. Sloped site located in a 
residential neighborhood
Across the street from land slated for 
future development. Hillside with 
sporadic vegetation cover, remnant 
asphalt pad, and stormwater outfall 
(runo– mitigation opportunity)
90
VACANT CITY-OWNED LAND
(Vacancy Duration) 
FEATURES
21 - 26 Years
16 - 21 Years
8 - 12 Years
City Park
1/8 Mile Buer to 
City Parks
1/4 Mile Buer to 
City Parks
El Cajon Blvd. 
Business Improv- 
ement District
Study Area 
Boundary
Stormwater 
Conveyance
Site
1/16 MI N
Wilson Middle 
School
Central 
Elementary 
School
Franklin 
Elementary 
School
Teralta
Park
Ward 
Canyon 
Park
EL CAJON BOULEVARD
UNIVERSITY AVE.
MEADE AVE.
MONROE AVE.
MADISON AVE.
IN
TE
RS
TA
TE
  1
5
M
AR
LB
O
RO
 A
VE
.
42
ND
 S
T.
41
ST
 S
T.
39
TH
 S
T.
40
TH
 S
T.
38
TH
 S
T.
37
TH
  S
T.
CE
N
TR
AL
 A
VE
.Boulevard 
Transit 
Plaza
City Heights 
Transit 
Plaza
Figure 2.5.3: Site Context - PopUp15
SITE 1: POPUP15
91
Figure 2.5.4: Site conditions - PopUp15
MTS Transit 
Plaza
PopUp15 Site
The Rock Church 
City Heights
Bicycle 
Route
Bicycle 
Route
Vehicular Access/Egress 
Through Alleyway
Pedestrian 
Access from 
South and West
Alley Outlet to 
Meade Ave.
Gas Station
Strip Mall 
Shopping 
Center
Single Family 
Detached 
Homes Single Family 
Detached 
Homes
‘Hu„man’ Style 
Multi-Family 
Apartments
Freeway-Level 
Rapid Transit 
Bus Station 
(Under 
Construction)
Brazilian 
Pepper Tree
40 . N
EL CAJON BLVD.
CE
N
TR
AL
 A
VE
.
I-1
5 
NO
RT
H
BO
UN
D 
O
NR
AM
P
IN
TE
RS
TA
TE
 1
5
41
ST
 A
VE
.
I-1
5 
O
FF
RA
M
P
100 . N
100 . N
100 . N
100 . N
100 . N
1994 2000
2005
2016
2010
NOTES:
- Vehicle yard with small structures prior to
freeway construction
- Used as a construction ‘lay down’ and 
equipment parking area during I-15 freeway 
construction
- Current (2016) construction of freeway-level 
rapid transit bus station
92
Figure 2.5.5: Historic aerial photos - PopUp15 (Source: Google Earth)
93
Figure 2.5.6: PopUp15 Assemblage Collage
94
Figure 2.5.7: Site conditions photos - PopUp15
95
96
VACANT CITY-OWNED LAND
(Vacancy Duration) 
FEATURES
26 - 30 Years
City Park
1/8 Mile Buer to 
City Parks
1/4 Mile Buer to 
City Parks
Sensitive Water 
Quality Area
Streams
Stormwater 
Conveyance
Site
1/16 MI N
Emerson/Bandini 
Elementary 
School
Rodriguez 
Elementary 
School
Fire 
Station 19
Greenwood Memorial 
Park & Mortuary
Undeveloped 
Open Space Park
Dorothy Petway 
Neighborhood Park
OCEAN VIEW BLVD.
NATIONAL AVE.
LOGAN AVE.
BOSTON AVE.
S 
36
TH
 S
T.
S 
37
TH
 S
T.
S 
35
TH
 S
T.S 
33
RD
  S
T.
S 
32
ND
 S
T.
IN
TE
RS
TA
TE
  8
05
CH
OL
LA
S C
RE
EK
Clay Ave. 
Mini Park
Figure 2.5.8: Site Context - Martin Avenue Park
SITE 2: MARTIN AVENUE PARK
97
Figure 2.5.9: Site conditions - Martin Avenue Park
Martin Ave. 
Park Site
Privately Owned 
Vacant Lot
Ephemeral Drainage Leading 
to Chollas Creek 
(Stormwater-Fed)
Vehicular Access from 
S 35th St., On-Street 
Parking
Single Family 
Detached 
Homes
Large Lot Single 
Family Detached 
Home
Single Family 
Detached 
Homes
Multi-Family 
Apartment 
Complex
1st Apostolic 
Church of San Diego 
(Across Street)
Cul-de-Sac
Pedestrian Access 
from North
Waist-High or 
Taller Vegetation
20 . N
MARTIN AVE.
ALLEYWAY
S 
35
TH
 S
T.
100 . N 100 . N
100 . N
100 . N
100 . N
1994 2000
2005
2016
2010
NOTES:
- Intermittent management of vegetation in 
ephemeral drainageway (increase in cover 
over time)
- No major changes in surrounding 
single-family detached neighborhood
98
Figure 2.5.10: Historic aerial photos - Martin Avenue Park (Source: Google Earth)
99
Figure 2.5.11: Martin Avenue Park Assemblage Collage
100
Figure 2.5.12: Site conditions photos - Martin Avenue Park
101
102
30+ Years
VACANT CITY-OWNED LAND
(Vacancy Duration) 
FEATURES
26 - 30 Years
8 - 12 Years
3 - 8 Years
City Park
1/8 Mile Buer to 
City Parks
1/4 Mile Buer to 
City Parks
Streams
Site
Stormwater 
Conveyance
Diamond Business 
Improvement 
District
1/16 MI N
Jacobs Center for 
Neighborhood 
Innovation
Gompers 
Park
Undeveloped 
Open Space Park
Euclid Ave.
Trolley 
Station
Market 
Creek 
Plaza
MARKET STREET
MARKET STREET
47
TH
 S
T.
ORAN
GE LI
NE T
ROLL
EY TR
ACKS
CHOLLAS CREEK
EU
CL
ID
 A
VE
.
Walls of 
Excellence 
Park
Figure 2.5.13: Site Context - Market Street Hillside
SITE 3: MARKET STREET HILLSIDE
103
200 . N 200 . N
200 . N
200 . N
200 . N
1994 2000
2005
2016
2010
NOTES:
- Vegetation management on site has changed
(increase in cover over time)
- Properties across Market Ave. demolished 
over 2005-2016 to make way for new 
development
- Adjacent boat dealer previously used the 
eastern portion of the site (asphalt pad) for 
parking
- Jacobs Center and parking across trolley 
tracks completed in early 2000’s
Figure 2.5.14: Historic aerial photos - Market Street Hillside (Source: Google Earth)
104
Figure 2.5.15: Site conditions - Market Street Hillside
 Vacant Lots Slated 
for Development Telecommunications 
Building
Boat 
Dealer
School Bus Lot
Single Family 
Detached 
Homes
Forkli 
Dealer
Market Street 
Hillside Site
Mobile Home Park
Trolley Tracks
(Orange Line)
Jacobs Center for 
Neighborhood 
Innovation
(Parking)
Pedestrian Access 
from North
Existing Trails
Waist-High or 
Taller Vegetation
Vehicular Access from 
Market St., On-Street 
Parking
40 . N
MARKET STREET
105
 Vacant Lots Slated 
for Development Telecommunications 
Building
Boat 
Dealer
School Bus Lot
Single Family 
Detached 
Homes
Forkli 
Dealer
Market Street 
Hillside Site
Mobile Home Park
Trolley Tracks
(Orange Line)
Jacobs Center for 
Neighborhood 
Innovation
(Parking)
Pedestrian Access 
from North
Existing Trails
Waist-High or 
Taller Vegetation
Vehicular Access from 
Market St., On-Street 
Parking
40 . N
MARKET STREET
106
Figure 2.5.16: Site conditions photos - Market Street Hillside
107
108
Figure 2.5.17: Site conditions photos - Market Street Hillside and properties across street
109
Figure 2.5.18: Market Street Hillside Assemblage Collage
110
The Framework for Green Urban Commons Development was applied to 
three unoccupied urban lots in the Mid-City/Southeastern San Diego study 
area, including PopUp15. Although portions of the PopUp15 site design 
were developed in collaboration with the El Cajon Boulevard BIA and the 
project Stakeholder Team, drawings included for PopUp15 in this section 
illustrate a refined Spatial Sca¥old as well as possible future landscape 
assemblage scenarios for the third phase of the Framework process (Ongoing 
Management). The researcher identified and undertook the latter two of three 
sites without community stakeholder involvement, using a combination of 
personal knowledge and site survey, reconnaissance, and “creative forensics” 
to explore the potential impact of GUC development. Selection methods and 
context drawings for each site are detailed in the Site Selection and Existing 
Conditions section of this document.
Scaled Spatial Sca¥old design drawings for each site are included along with 
a narrative description of initial site infrastructure. In addition, the researcher 
determined potential activities and possible GUC scenarios for each of the 
three sites (expressed using drawings and diagrams). These hypothetical 
design scenarios are intentionally loose and are meant to express possible 
future assemblages for each site that could result from the same physical 
starting point.
ASSEMBLAGE DESIGN 
SCENARIOS
“Objects, bodies, expressions, qualities, and territories that come together for varying 
periods of time, ideally to create new ways of functioning” (Deleuze and Guattari 1987)
111
Figure 2.6.1: 
National Avenue 
in Southcrest near 
Martin Avenue 
Park
112
SITE 1: POPUP15
Located in the densest urban environment of the three 
case studies, the design for PopUp15 had to negotiate a 
diverse array of stakeholder interests while contending 
with severely compacted soil, full sun exposure, and 
a busy 6-lane boulevard on its southern edge. The 
site’s relatively flat condition, degraded soil, and urban 
condition predisposed it to a plaza-like design. The 
neighborhood surrounding the site is experiencing 
increased gentrification pressure, so scenario schemes 
focus on grassroots and community-based open space 
configurations. Integration with the nearby transit plaza 
and bicycle route is also a key site concern.
Figure 2.6.3: Bikeway in City Heights near PopUp15
Figure 2.6.2: Boulevard Trasit Plaza at I-15
113
20 . N
SPATIAL SCAFFOLD
FEATURES
Shipping Container
Paved Entry / Workshop Area
Decomposed Granite Plaza
Planting Area
Alley / Vehicle Access
Fenced Border
Bicycle Racks
Utilities
Fenced Storage
2
7
8
3
9 6
1
1
5
1
8
7
9
6
5
4
3
2
4
EL CAJON BLVD.
I-1
5 
 O
NR
AM
P
CE
NT
RA
L 
AV
E.
Figure 2.6.4: PopUp15 Spatial Sca’ old
114
POPUP15
POTENTIAL DESIGN SCENARIOS
1'x1' concrete paver patio frames D2 
40' container and bicycle parking
1'x1' concrete paver patio provides 
ADA access and frames areas for 40' 
and (potentially) 10' containers to be 
used as workshop spaces
Decomposed granite or pavers 
contiguous with B1
A - THRESHOLD
Decomposed granite or asphalt plaza 
for large events and fairs
Decomposed granite plaza provides 
forum for small-scale events and 
(potentially) raised-bed planters for 
urban agriculture
Decomposed granite or pavers with a 
4'x4' field of concrete sleeves to 
support scaolding and other 
furnishings
B1 - PLAZA
3/4" minus compacted gravel parking 
area
Vehicle-grade pavers or decomposed granite contiguous with B1B2 - PLAZA
Concession stand area with 1'x1' 
concrete pavers
Community bicycle workshop area 
with 1'x1' concrete pavers
Decomposed granite or pavers 
contiguous with B1
C - PASSIVE/SOCIAL 
AREA
Public-private partnership, access 
limited to events
Nonprofit or community run GUC, 
constrained public access
Community or nonprofit oversight, 
city parks dept. maintenance and 
investment (iterated as public park)
MANAGEMENT 
STRUCTURE
SCENARIO
LANDSCAPE SPACES
GREEN SPACES
EDGES
Shade tree planterE - IN-GROUND 
PLANTER
Chain link fencing encloses perimeter 
for security, small gates open at 
southwest corner, planter beds 
outside fence along southern edge
Chain link fencing encloses 
perimeter, wide gates open at 
southwest corner, planter beds 
outside fence along southern edge
OpenF - SOUTH & WEST 
EDGES
Chain link fencing encloses 
perimeter, wide gates open to alley 
for vehicle access
Open with bollards parallel to 
alleyway
G - EAST 
(ALLEY-ADJACENT) 
EDGE
Existing fence remainsH - NORTH EDGE
Container houses performance and 
event equipment, provides backdrop 
for performance stage
Art gallery and event space in 
modified shipping container
Container stores on-site furnishings 
and event equipment
D1 - SHIPPING 
CONTAINER
Bicycle workshop storage Concession stand or additional storage in modified 
shipping container, fenced storage area encloses 
restrooms and "back of house" infrastructure
D2 - SHIPPING 
CONTAINER & GATED 
STORAGE
COMMUNITY MAKER 
SPACE/INNOVATION CENTER
EVENT SPACE OPEN PUBLIC PLAZA
Figure 2.6.5: PopUp15 Potential Design Scenarios and Program Area Key
115
20 . N
FEATURES
Landscape Spaces
Green Spaces
Threshold
Passive/Social Area
Plaza
Storage/ 
Infrastructure
In-Ground Planter
Edge
A
B1
D1
F
H
G
D2
B2C
E
Figure 2.6.6: PopUp15 Landscape Program Area Key Plan
116
Figure 2.6.7: PopUp15 Spatial Sca’ old Rendering
Spatial Sca¡ old
The key organizing elements of the PopUp15 Spatial Sca¥ old are the 
placement of storage containers and arrangement of the paved entry 
area. The articulated edge of the entry patio can accommodate a range 
of potential amenities such as an additional 10’ shipping container or food 
truck. The paved area also provides ADA access to the workshop space and 
creates a threshold from the corner entry point to the plaza beyond. The level 
decomposed granite plaza area can accommodate a wide array of activities, 
and the enclosed northern parts of the site provide important storage and 
infrastructural spaces. The decomposed granite can later be extracted and 
replaced with more permanent paving materials.
Figure 2.6.8: Key plan with view angle, NTS
117
Figure 2.6.10: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.9: PopUp15 Scenario 1 Rendering
Scenario 1: Community Maker Space/Innovation Center
This design scenario assumes oversight and assumption of liability by a 
nonprofit or community organization such as the Boulevard BIA. Several 
organizations operating in the City Heights community expressed interest in 
using the site, including a local arts organization and a co¥ ee cart company. 
This scenario site design, featuring a modest stage and highly modified storage 
containers, has limited public access hours that coincide with individual 
stakeholders’ hours of occupation on site. One of the containers is converted 
to art gallery with rolling door entrances and the other is used as a workshop 
space. The restricted public access is a result of material investment by 
stakeholders. The alley-adjacent portion of the site is dedicated to vehicular 
access.
118
Scenario 2: Event Space
This scenario design assumes oversight by a public-private partnership, 
with physical access limited to events. Treated as a publicly-owned venue, 
community members may equitably access the space for festivals and 
events. Amenities include a stage, festival booths around perimeter, portable 
restrooms, and an outdoor film screen.
Figure 2.6.11: PopUp15 Scenario 2 Rendering
Figure 2.6.12: Key plan with view angle, NTS
119
Scenario 3: Open Public Plaza
This design treats the site as a public space prototype, whereby open public 
access is granted in order to test the site’s viability as a park. Grassroots 
community-based or nonprofit oversight, combined with City Parks 
Department maintenance and investment would allow the project to be 
iterated as a formal public space. More passive seating and planting areas are 
shown with minimal enclosure along edges. A single concessionaire/vendor 
activates the space, and a child play area and games attract visitors to the site.
Figure 2.6.14: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.13: PopUp15 Scenario 3 Rendering
120
SITE 2: MARTIN AVE. PARK
Although the site is currently unimproved, San Diego 
Parks and Recreation owns Martin Avenue Park and 
has identified the space for public space development. 
According to the 2016 Unfunded Parks Improvement List, 
the City is seeking between $600,000 and $1.25 million to 
fund park development (SDP&R 2016). Located well over 
a quarter-mile distance from the next active park, the 
property has the potential to fill a large gap in the public 
space deficient community of Southeastern San Diego. 
The community is predominantly Latino (83%), and 
the area immediately surrounding the park consists of 
single-family detached homes (SANDAG, 2017). Canyons 
and drainage ways throughout the neighborhood carry 
water to the San Diego Harbor through Chollas Creek, 
and a stormwater-fed ephemeral creek runs along the 
southern edge of the steeply sloped site.
Figure 2.6.16: Chollas Creek - Degraded urban drainageway
Figure 2.6.15: Ocean View Boulevard near Martin Ave. Park
121
10 . N
SPATIAL SCAFFOLD
FEATURES
Entry Overlook
Modular Aluminum Ramp
Inaccessible Planting Area
Concrete Stair and Ramp
Flat-Graded Program Area
Gabion Retaining Walls
Creek-Adjacent Planting Area
Creek / Stormwater Channel
MARTIN AVE.
1
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
8
6 5
5
4
3
2
7
8%
8%
8%
Figure 2.6.17: Martin Avenue Park Spatial Sca’ old
122
MARTIN AVE. PARK
POTENTIAL DESIGN SCENARIOS
Overlook and information standA - THRESHOLD
Picnic AreaBarbecue and picnic areaB - PASSIVE/SOCIAL 
AREA
Nature play area
Mulched area with raised garden 
beds
C - PASSIVE/SOCIAL 
AREA
Nonprofit or educational 
organization oversight, city parks 
dept. maintenance and investment
Community or nonprofit oversight, 
city parks dept. maintenance and 
investment (iterated as public park)
Nonprofit or community run GUC, 
constrained public access
SCENARIO
LANDSCAPE SPACES
GREEN SPACES
CIRCULATION
EDGES
"Willow run" and rain garden Native riparian gardenE - ECOSYSTEM 
SERVICE/ 
STORMWATER
Native pollinator garden with signage 
along ramp
Ornamental xeriscape planting area Fruit trees and pollinator plants 
along slope, vines growing in-ground 
and upward along ramp trellis
F - INACCESSIBLE 
SLOPED PLANTING 
AREA
Interpretive native plant gardenOrnamental xeriscape planting area Herb GardenG - ACCESSIBLE/ 
INTERACTIVE 
PLANTING AREA
Open edge, earth contoured for 
maximum stormwater infiltration
Fence line even with neighboring 
borders
Fence line even with neighboring 
borders
H - SOUTH EDGE
Integrate with existing neighbor walls and fencingI - WEST AND EAST PROPERTY LINES
Open edge Fenced for security and pest 
protection
J - NORTHERN 
STREET SIDE EDGE
Enlarged overlooks along ramp, 
overhead lighting, rainwater 
harvesting and shade structures
Optional overlook and stair areas, 
overhead lighting
Trellis and shade structures overheadD - ALUMINUM 
ACCESS RAMP
NEIGHBORHOOD PARK HABITAT GARDEN COMMUNITY GARDEN
MANAGEMENT 
STRUCTURE
Figure 2.6.18: Martin Avenue Park Potential Design Scenarios and Program Area Key
123
10 . N
FEATURES
Landscape Spaces
Green Spaces
Threshold
Passive/Social Area
Circulation Path
Ecosystem Service/ 
Stormwater
Inaccessible
Edge
A
B
J
C
E
H
D
G
II
F
F
Figure 2.6.19: Martin Avenue Park Landscape Program Area Key Plan
124
Spatial Sca¡ old
The site’s steep topography has the most profound impact upon Spatial 
Sca¥ old design. The design includes minimal site grading and the installation 
of a modular aluminum ramp to access lower, flat-graded social spaces. 
Gabion baskets are used for soil retention and seat walls. Because of the 
problematic location between homes, the social gathering spaces are located 
past the existing neighboring homes.  Stormwater treatment and runo¥ 
mitigation are key concerns on the site, and the site’s friable, exposed topsoil 
makes it an attractive candidate for planting areas and urban food production.
Figure 2.6.20: Martin Avenue Park Spatial Sca’ old Rendering
Figure 2.6.21: Key plan with view angle, NTS
125
Scenario 1: Neighborhood Park
This scenario assumes community organization or nonprofit oversight as well 
as an in-depth partnership with the City Parks and Recreation Department. The 
Parks Department could help with maintenance, initial investment costs, and 
work along with the community to iterate the space as a public park. Aligned 
with the City’s existing objective for the space to include “landscaping,” a 
“picnic area,” and a “children’s play area,” this design accommodates each 
with an inexpensive, temporary materials palette (SD Planning Dept., n.d.). It 
is recommended that the city first “test” this arrangement as a “safe to fail” 
public space prototype before erecting more permanent landscape elements.
Figure 2.6.23: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.22: Martin Avenue Park Scenario 1 Rendering
126
Scenario 2: Habitat Garden
This scenario assumes nonprofit or educational organization oversight with 
minimal City Parks department maintenance and investment. The design is 
focused on native plant cultivation and has infrastructure for passive, low-
intensity visitor use. Overlooks and stairs on the ramp may be added to enhance 
visitor experience and increase opportunities for interpretive educational 
signage. A rain garden on the lower level highlights the journey of water from 
cloud to creek, and a natural play area is provided for neighborhood children.
Figure 2.6.24: Martin Avenue Park Scenario 2 Rendering
Figure 2.6.25: Key plan with view angle, NTS
127
Scenario 3: Community Garden
This design scheme assumes minimal institutional support with nonprofit 
or grassroots community-based GUC oversight. An overhead trellis along 
walkway provides additional growing space, and the sloped hill around 
the ramp is planted with fruit trees. The flat-graded areas are converted for 
maximum agricultural production. Restricted public access and fencing 
protect the space from theœ  and vandalism.
Figure 2.6.27: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.26: Martin Avenue Park Scenario 3 Rendering
128
SITE 3: MARKET HILLSIDE
The Market Avenue Hillside is located within eyesight of 
the Jacobs Center for Neighborhood Innovation—the 
same organization responsible for overseeing aspects of 
the City of San Diego’s Obama-era designated Promise 
Zone programs. In addition to falling within the Promise 
Zone, the site is also within the Diamond Business 
Improvement Association’s district (an group with similar 
organizational capacities as the Boulevard BIA). The hill 
is also located near both trolley and bus lines. Large 
vacant lots across street await residential development 
alongside a windowless telecommunications building. 
Given recent e¥orts by the Jacobs Center, economic 
development in the area is both imminent and desired.
This landscape is also part of the city’s network of 
canyons and drainage ways. Exposed, friable topsoil 
can accommodate urban agricultural production as 
well as native habitat gardens. A drain from the higher 
roadway dispenses untreated stormwater to a portion 
of the site, making runo¥ mitigation a key concern. A 
large, degraded asphalt pad on the eastern side of the lot 
provides the opportunity for a large, relatively flat-graded 
gathering space.
Figure 2.6.29: Market Creek Plaza (front) and Jacobs Center (rear)
Figure 2.6.28: Market St. at 47th St. near Hillside Site
129
Spatial Sca¡ old
The Spatial Sca¥ old design for this lot includes multiple access points because 
of its large size. An overlook landing, retained by a terrace of gabions, serves 
as the main access point. A 5% graded ramp retained by decomposed granite 
leads from this landing through the rest of the site’s social spaces. Additional 
stairways on the northern property line lead from the sidewalk to the design’s 
flat-graded social areas. Poured concrete curbs retain the decomposed 
granite, mulch, or pavers on these flat areas, and the large existing asphalt 
section is repaired and re-sealed to act as a plaza space.  A small aluminum or 
concrete bridge leads across the existing stormwater outlet pipe between the 
asphalt plaza and smaller flat-graded program area. 
Figure 2.6.31: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.30: Market Hillside Spatial Sca’ old Rendering
130
20 . N
SPATIAL SCAFFOLD
FEATURES
Entry Overlook
Sloped Walkway
Inaccessible Planting Area
Concrete Stair
Flat-Graded Program Area
Gabion Retaining Walls
Bridge over Stormwater Drain
Rain Garden
Flat-Graded Asphalt Plaza
Fenced Border with Trolley
Existing Vegetation
MARKET ST.
1
8
7
9
10
11
6
5
4
3
2
1
9
8
10
6
5
4 4
3
2
7
5%
11
Figure 2.6.32: Market Street Hillside Spatial Sca’ old
131
20 . N
SPATIAL SCAFFOLD
FEATURES
Entry Overlook
Sloped Walkway
Inaccessible Planting Area
Concrete Stair
Flat-Graded Program Area
Gabion Retaining Walls
Bridge over Stormwater Drain
Rain Garden
Flat-Graded Asphalt Plaza
Fenced Border with Trolley
Existing Vegetation
MARKET ST.
1
8
7
9
10
11
6
5
4
3
2
1
9
8
10
6
5
4 4
3
2
7
5%
11
132
MARKET HILLSIDE
POTENTIAL DESIGN SCENARIOS
Seating, overlook and information stand, decomposed granite baseA - THRESHOLD
Picnic and seating area with mulch or 
decomposed granite, concrete curb 
edge
Playground and seating area with 
mulch or decomposed granite, 
concrete curb edge
Picnic area, 1'x1' concrete paver or 
decomposed granite base, concrete 
curb edge
B - PASSIVE/SOCIAL 
AREA
Remnant asphalt base covered with 
mulch, raised garden beds, gathering 
space, and children's playground
Asphalt base and wooden-framed 
skate park
Asphalt, decomposed granite or pavers 
with 4'x4' field of concrete sleeves to 
support modular furnishings
C - PLAZA
Nonprofit or grassroots community 
run GUC, constrained public access
Community or nonprofit oversight, 
city parks dept. maintenance and 
investment (iterated as public park)
Community or nonprofit oversight, 
city parks dept. maintenance and 
investment (iterated as public park)
SCENARIO
LANDSCAPE SPACES
GREEN SPACES
Native riparian plantings and rain garden
E - ECOSYSTEM 
SERVICE/ 
STORMWATER
Community garden planter bedsNative pollinator garden with signage 
along ramp
Ornamental xeriscape planting areaF - ACCESSIBLE/ 
INTERACTIVE 
PLANTING AREA
Terraced community garden planting 
beds
Children's' "run" and nature play area Native chaparral planting areaG - ACCESSIBLE/ 
INTERACTIVE 
PLANTING AREA
Fruit trees and pollinator plants 
along slope
Ornamental xeriscape planting area Ornamental xeriscape planting areaH - INACCESSIBLE 
SLOPED P.A.
Native chaparral planting areaI - INACCESSIBLE 
SLOPED P.A.
CIRCULATION
Decomposed granite pathway with gabion retaining walls, basic concrete stairs, and 
bridge over stormwater structure
D - RAMP AND 
STAIRS
COMMUNITY PLAY COMMUNITY GARDEN OPEN PUBLIC PARK & PLAZA
MANAGEMENT 
STRUCTURE
EDGES
Fenced for security and pest 
protection
Open OpenJ - NORTHERN EDGE
Integrate with existing neighbor fencing, extend to southern property 
edge and enclose for safety (trolley) and security
K - WEST, EAST , AND 
SOUTH EDGES
Figure 2.6.33: Market Hillside Potential Design Scenarios and Program Area Key
133
Scenario 1: Community Play
Although the City Parks & Recreation Department does not currently own the 
property, this scenario assumes community organization or nonprofit oversight 
as well as an in-depth partnership with SD P&R. The Parks Department could 
help with maintenance, initial investment costs, and work along with the 
community to iterate the space as a public park. A full-scale skateboard park is 
proposed for the large asphalt plaza. Such a park could be open to the public 
or managed on a fee-basis by an organization like the YMCA. A playground and 
seating area is proposed for the smaller programmable space, and a portion of 
the hillside is converted to a natural play area for children. 
Figure 2.6.35: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.34: Market Hillside Scenario 1 Rendering
134
20 . N
FEATURES
Landscape Spaces Green Spaces
Threshold
Passive/Social 
Space
Plaza
Circulation Path
Accessible
Inaccessible
Ecosystem 
Service/Stormwater
Edge
A
B
C
D
E
I
I
K
J
G
H
H
F
Figure 2.6.36: Market Hillside Landscape Program Area Key Plan
135
20 . N
FEATURES
Landscape Spaces Green Spaces
Threshold
Passive/Social 
Space
Plaza
Circulation Path
Accessible
Inaccessible
Ecosystem 
Service/Stormwater
Edge
A
B
C
D
E
I
I
K
J
G
H
H
F
136
Scenario 2: Community Garden
This scheme assumes that a nonprofit or grassroots community group leads 
the management structure of the GUC. Oriented primarily toward agricultural 
production, the site design includes constrained public access for security. A 
small playground and raised planter beds populate the large plaza space, and 
the smaller flat-graded area serves as a picnic area and stormwater garden 
overlook. Additional in-ground community garden plots and orchard trees 
populate the hillside. Figure 2.6.38: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.37: Market Hillside Scenario 2 Rendering
137
Scenario 3: Open Public Park & Plaza
In addition to the first, this scenario also assumes grassroots community 
organization or nonprofit oversight as well as an in-depth partnership with 
San Diego Parks and Recreation. The parks department could help with 
maintenance, initial investment costs, and work along with the community 
to iterate the space as a public space prototype park. The large asphalt area 
features a stage and event space, with the smaller flat-graded area serving 
as a gathering space and and ticketing/infrastructure area during events. 
This scenario may prove especially desirable in the event of medium-density 
residential development on adjacent vacant land.
Figure 2.6.39: Key plan with view angle, NTS
Figure 2.6.38: Market Hillside Scenario 3 Rendering

139
The goal of this project is to encourage the creation of green urban commons 
(GUC’s) in San Diego’s Mid-City and Southeastern communities as a means 
to improve resident quality of life and urban resilience. The researcher used 
Rod Barnett’s six hallmarks of an emergent civic landscape to inform PopUp15 
action research and develop an outcome-based Framework for new GUC 
development in San Diego. To assess the e¥ectiveness of the Framework’s 
prescriptive recommendations, it was applied to three vacant urban lots in 
the Mid-City/Southeastern San Diego study area. These case study designs 
yield heuristic insights into the explicit application of emergence theory to 
both GUC’s and landscape architectural practice in general. Although the 
conclusions drawn here are related specifically to the development of GUCs in 
the San Diego study area, insights from this project can be construed to similar 
urban contexts.
ACTION RESEARCH AND
FRAMEWORK IMPLEMENTATION
The initial mapping and lot identification process was a positive step toward the 
development of new GUC’s in the project study area, though the identification 
of opportunities alone seemed insu¥icient in order to e¥ect real change in San 
Diego’s underserved communities. The Framework for GUC Creation in this 
project proposes tangible landscape and social outcomes in order to create 
GUC’s that exhibit emergent characteristics at the site scale. Emergence theory 
also served as a powerful operative metaphor for understanding the startup 
and ongoing evolution of GUCs. Through an iterative research-through-
designing process, each of the three Framework components was intentionally 
correlated to one or more di¥erent aspects of Barnett’s six hallmarks of an 
emergent civic landscape. Each of these components was broken down 
into simpler constituent parts, organized within a three-phase GUC project 
process, and hitched to specific project outcomes (see Figure 2.3.2). Action 
research and the application of the Framework to case study sites allowed the 
researcher to speculate as to whether or not these specific outcomes can be 
achieved in real-world GUC projects.
DISCUSSION
Fig. 3.2: City-owned vacant lot in Southcrest
Fig. 3.1: Vacant lot at I-15 and University Ave
140
An intentional link to social 
activity and novel forms of 
occupation
Explicit opportunities for the 
appearance of novel social 
properties 
Local control over local 
conditions
Consideration of same-level, 
top-down, and bottom-up 
influence
Defined relationshps between 
social systems and ecosystems
A commitment to pluralism 
(strong emergence)
SIX CHARACTERISTICS OF AN 
‘EMERGENT’ CIVIC LANDSCAPE
INDIVIDUAL ‘PUBLIC SPACE 
PROTOTYPE’ PROJECT OUTCOMES
OUTCOME 1: 
Determine collective values and 
landscape objectives
OUTCOME 2: 
Define the relationships between social 
systems and ecosystems that will occur 
within the site (“the situation”)
OUTCOME 3: 
Negotiate parameters for same-level, 
bottom-up, and top-down influence over 
GUC management
OUTCOME 4:   
Determine physical organization of 
space that accommodates future 
adaptation and novel forms of 
occupation
OUTCOME 5: 
Assess and negotiate development 
regulations, code, and public safety 
requirements as they pertain to site
OUTCOME 6:   
Designer(s) and stakeholders collaborate 
on site design, program, and initial 
configuration of elements
OUTCOME 7:   
Teams of users and professionals 
construct spatial sca„old infrastructure 
and site amenities
OUTCOME 8:   
Internal democratic mechanisms in GUC 
management make value-based 
appraisals of landscape function, 
allocating resources and dictating 
changes to built infrastructure
OUTCOME 9:   
Resources are leveraged to continually 
iterate landscape elements in alignment 
with user needs
OUTCOME 10:   
New spatial use patterns emerge and are 
accommodated by adaptive 
management of GUC
Figure 3.3: Connections between proposed Framework outcomes and emergence theory (A¦er Barnett 2013)
141
Emergence and Fulfillment of Outcomes
Framework application outcomes can be related directly 
to Barnett’s six emergent landscape criteria (Figure 3.3). 
If met, these outcomes will likely ensure that a new GUC 
will exhibit several if not all of Barnett’s six emergent 
criteria. The PopUp15 project was particularly useful for 
understanding how the Framework can be applied to a 
specific site. Although it is di¥icult at this stage to claim 
whether or not there are on-site emergent patterns 
(novel forms of occupation, individual users making 
small incremental changes to their environment, etc.), 
several project outcomes have already been achieved. 
For example, the primary researcher worked directly 
with stakeholders to determine collective values 
and landscape objectives for the site, collaborated 
on site design, program, and initial configuration of 
elements, and engaged professionals and end-users in 
the construction of spatial sca¥old elements and site 
amenities (Outcomes 1, 6, and 7). Each of these can be 
correlated directly to Barnett’s relation of “local control 
over local conditions” to emergent civic landscapes. 
Similar relationships can be recognized across the other 
Framework outcomes.
The achievement of the latter three outcomes (8 through 
10) is substantially more di¥icult to evaluate for either 
PopUp15 or the Assemblage Design Scenarios, as the 
outcomes relate to a temporal frame beyond project start-
up, site design, and initial construction. Nonetheless, 
the stage has been set at PopUp15 for the ongoing 
development of emergent landscape characteristics. 
Future GUC projects that adhere to the Framework, GUC 
Project Process, and attached outcomes are also likely to 
be set on this trajectory.
Challenges to Implementation
PopUp15 action research and Assemblage Scenario 
Design case studies revealed several barriers and 
challenges to GUC project initiation and implementation 
of the Framework. These issues were related primarily 
to stakeholder participation, design representation. 
construction and institutional approval.
Stakeholder Organization
Despite attempts within the Framework, the researcher 
observed that it might remain di¥icult for individual 
community members to participate in GUC development. 
Stakeholder mobilization in general seems to favor 
pre-established groups, particularly those organized 
as a formal nonprofit. A nonprofit organization has 
sta¥/resources and is oœen more nimble at navigating 
bureaucracy than groups of resident-activist stakeholders. 
Although community members in City Heights benefit 
from the services provided at PopUp15 (or, speculatively, 
from the designs for the other two case study sites), 
barriers such as time, resources, and unfamiliarity 
with land use negotiation seemed to discourage area 
residents to engage with the project. That said, the 
PopUp15 Stewardship Team has kept an open door to 
community-led activities within the PopUp15 space, 
and groups like Bikes del Pueblo, The Rock Church, and 
the Media Arts Center have drawn groups of community 
volunteers to participate in the construction of site 
elements and development of the space. Furthermore, 
there is risk that project initiation and oversight may 
be too reliant upon designer involvement in the project 
for spatial sca¥old iteration and negotiation with city 
agencies. In this regard, clear designer deliverables and 
a work timeline – similar to those used in PopUp15 – can 
help define organizational boundaries, set expectations, 
and prevent stakeholders from relying too heavily on a 
designer for project sustainability.
Landscape Construction
Development of public space proved to be di¥icult 
with ad-hoc construction on a low budget.  For the 
PopUp15 project in particular, the permitting processes 
for overhead or vertical structures remained a strong 
enough barrier that it limited the Stakeholder Team’s 
interest in constructing certain elements such as a stage 
and pergola. More involved construction and grading 
involve permitting and contractor involvement, as well 
as a higher project budget. Certain user-constructed 
site elements in GUCs may conflict with development 
regulations (ex. unpermitted stage construction or site 
grading), and clearer boundaries are needed in order for 
non-professional GUC stakeholders to grasp what is and 
is not allowed during site construction. A useful place 
to begin may be the guidelines for community garden 
construction set forward by the City, though the diverse 
array of land uses within GUCs will likely entail further 
definition of policy.
142
Site Analysis and Design
The researcher’s role in Spatial Sca¥old determination 
and site analysis was a di¥icult territory to navigate, even 
with extensive contextual and theoretical exploration. 
Per Barnett, “landscape architectural designers should 
be interested in what is actually functioning in an open 
system, and what the mechanisms of this functioning are” 
(2013). It may be di¥icult for designers unfamiliar with 
emergence theory to use this Framework, particularly 
as it pertains to site forensics and understanding 
landscapes as assemblages that are always becoming 
and never twice the same. The values and outcomes of 
the Framework are meant to remove some of the mystery 
behind an emergentist practice of landscape architecture, 
though further study and pragmatic research is needed 
to evaluate the e¥ectiveness of the Framework for those 
who have hitherto not encountered the concept.
Representation/Media for Decision-Making
When producing design drawings, it was di¥icult for the 
researcher to convey the future of user-generated space 
without imposing too much form or vision. This is an 
especially important consideration because Barnett 
stipulates that a designer should not be a “purveyor 
of top-down solutions but a discoverer of emergent 
processes,” and that they are instead responsible for 
establishing “an initial set of conditions…that generates 
a process of realization” (2015). What, then, is the right 
balance of representation? Spatial sca¥old scenario 
projections in plan, although useful to the designer for 
determining programmatic use zones, are not as helpful 
to convey to stakeholder groups the vibrant social 
potential of a place. Such projective scenarios, similar 
to those included in the Assemblage chapter, may be 
useful to stakeholder groups for marketing purposes. 
Furthermore, the Spatial Sca¥old drawings in this 
document may be too schematic or high level for current 
institutional approval processes. Not all designers, 
however, will be in a position to produce evocative 
renderings or 3D models to convey the character of 
an emergent GUC. The notion of ‘assemblage’ helped 
the researcher organize thoughts about how to draw 
projected scenarios and plan for future use (iteration 
within the design process itself), though further 
exploration into the graphic representation of emergent 
landscapes is called for. 
Institutional Support
Based primarily on the helpfulness of San Diego’s 
Development Services Department during the initiation 
of PopUp15, much of this Framework relies on the 
assumption that local government agencies responsible 
for overseeing vacant lots will be amenable to GUC 
construction and go out of their way to be accommodate 
stakeholder interests. This is not always a given 
circumstance, and it remains possible for government 
Figure 3.4: 
Z-Street Pocket 
Park - Currently 
undeveloped City 
Parks-owned 
property in 
Southcrest
143
agencies to stonewall projects entirely. The researcher’s 
hope is for this Framework to develop into a more formal 
GUC permitting and approval process for San Diego and 
other cities.
IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE
Recommendations included in the Framework 
are strategy-based and open-ended enough to be 
transferable to a wide range of situations beyond San 
Diego. The three components of the Framework, Spatial 
Sca¥old, Materials Menu, and Social Structure, could be 
useful to other communities interested in creating new 
GUC’s.
Transferability
The Framework itself is meant to de-mystify the process 
of GUC start-up and implementation. The included 
recommendations are meant to lower organizational and 
knowledge barriers to the development of new public 
spaces on city-owned public lands, helping to loosen 
restrictions and open up new ways of inhabiting urban 
public spaces.
Role of the Researcher/Designer
The role of the researcher was to set initial conditions for 
the ongoing social and physical evolution of a landscape. 
An initial physical sca¥old is proposed and constructed, 
from which social meaning and material conditions 
are intentionally leœ to evolve and emerge. In light of 
emergence theory, proposed design strategies in this 
project remain cognizant of citizen decision-making and 
layperson construction. An inherent tension, however, 
is that while an idea behind GUC’s is that citizens 
participate and invent meaning within unoccupied urban 
lots, the designer’s role includes the development of 
explicit spatial propositions that accommodate potential 
desired uses and/or strengthen current practices.
When discussing the role of the designer in emergent 
landscape architectural practice, Barnett asserts that 
the desired relationship between human and nonhuman 
systems on a site “will emerge from an involvement 
of the designer with the situation that includes a 
participation in the situation su¥icient to develop 
the terms of the situation, and to enable design to 
be regulated by the situation.” This statement means 
essentially that design does not occur in a vacuum, 
that the designer has their own interests and biases, 
including the fact that they are part of the system that 
is being designed (Barnett 2015). To achieve desirable 
emergent landscape designs, Barnett a¥irms the 
importance of what Elizabeth Meyer calls “situatedness,” 
or the notion that “landscape architectural theory is 
situational; it is historical, contingent, pragmatic, and 
ad hoc, ” and that it “must be based on observation, on 
what is known through experience, on the immediate 
and the sensory…” (1997). This idea of “situatedness” 
can be correlated to the role of the researcher. As an 
outsider to the majority-latino study area who identifies 
as a white male, the researcher had to be keenly aware of 
his own hidden biases and as well as the potential for his 
propositions to inadvertently drive gentrification and the 
displacement of existing community character. Careful 
site observation and analysis, stakeholder interviews, 
experience with human-centered design tactics, and the 
designer’s past professional experience working with at-
risk youth in City Heights helped the researcher assume 
a role characterized by definition, contextualization, and 
facilitation. 
CONCLUSIONS
The goal of this research-through-designing project is to 
encourage the creation of GUCs in San Diego’s Mid-City 
and Southeastern communities as a means to improve 
resident quality of life and civic resilience. By considering 
the project’s design propositions and revisiting precedent 
literature, it can be speculated that this project has 
achieved its goal.
Resident Quality of Life
Measuring the impact that GUCs have on resident quality 
of life is a research project unto itself and in many ways 
remains beyond the scope of this project. That said, 
many of the positive ecological, public health, and 
resident perception outcomes related to iterative vacant 
land interventions can be correlated to PopUp15 and the 
outcomes of the GUC Framework. Bikes del Pueblo, for 
example, has converted a patch of derelict urban land 
into a dynamic workshop environment where residents 
are empowered to be physically active and encouraged 
to use sustainable transit. By appropriating vacant land 
for public benefit, GUC projects can change perceptions 
about entire neighborhoods by fostering “cues to care” 
within urban communities (Foo et al., 2013; Nassauer, 
144
1995) and mitigating “physical disorder” linked to 
poor health outcomes such as cardiovascular disease 
and mental illness (Garvin et al., 2012). In addition to 
changing residents’ attitudes and perceptions, aspects of 
the Framework prompt the end-users of GUCs to engage 
in ongoing management of the project and the physical 
construction of space. By actually getting people involved 
in the construction and management of new public 
spaces, individuals are likely to feel that they can e¥ect 
positive change in their daily living environments and 
alter the urban fabric in ways that more closely fulfill their 
own goals, expectations, and desires, thereby increasing 
resident quality of life.
Gentrification and Immersion
Although much can be said in favor of the iterative 
urbanism proposals of this project, vacant land 
development is a contentious process than can lead to 
gentrification. High budget GUC projects, for example, 
may involve various commercial interests that can 
conflict with whether GUCs function as public space or 
as spaces of commercial exchange. Social and financial 
investment in vacant land, although considered 
beneficial, can also increase the risk of gentrification and 
displacement of existing residents.
Harris’s concerns regarding temporary urbanism and 
gentrification might be assuaged in part by the fact 
that this project specifically proposes the development 
of GUC’s with emergent landscape characteristics. As 
discussed in the introductory chapter of this document, 
GUC’s are by definition collectively managed by diverse 
stakeholder groups that allow participants to assert their 
“right to the city” (Bela 2014, Iveson 2013). Furthermore, 
emergence theory as applied to landscape architecture 
stipulates that civic spaces should explicitly provide 
“local control over local conditions” (Barnett, 2013). 
The GUC development Framework and site designs 
proposed by this project, therefore, are judicious in 
their navigation of the pop-up imaginary of immersion. 
Given the fact that the aim of this project is to improve 
urban conditions for residents in San Diego’s most 
disadvantaged neighborhoods, proposed interventions 
are sensitive to existing neighborhood character, 
and the co-design strategies recommended in the 
Framework accommodate local capacity-building rather 
than external investment and the displacement of 
existing residents. An emergence theory-aligned design 
approach helped the researcher to critically navigate this 
conceptual terrain of “immersion,” incorporating past 
spatial narratives while laying the groundwork to engage 
visitors in both a site’s future and present conditions 
(Harris 2015a).
Figure 3.5: 
Parklet in the 
Sunset District 
of San Francisco 
- a result of the 
city’s formalized 
oversight and 
approvals process
145
Urban resilience
The nascent practice of “safe-to-fail” iterative urbanism 
projects like GUCs has been directly correlated to 
notions of urban resilience (Ahern, 2011; Lister, 2016). 
By responding to disruptions in the socioeconomic or 
ecological fabric of the city, GUCs can leverage limited 
resources for public benefit. In addition to providing 
spatially explicit landscape functions, negotiated 
spaces like GUC interventions are also recognized as 
contributors to the resilience of urban systems because 
they “loosen” existing institutional structures and 
provide opportunities for community empowerment 
despite adverse environmental conditions (Radywl and 
Biggs, 2013). This loosening of institutional structures 
opens up opportunities for stakeholder mobilization 
and democratic value negotiation processes that are 
important to political capacity building and greater 
urban resilience (Arnstein 1969; Juarez and Brown, 2008; 
Radywyl and Biggs, 2013). 
Although the institutional approval process and value-
based negotiation of land use build political capacity 
(and thereby urban resilience), the question remains: 
political capacity for whom? In the case of PopUp15, the 
BIA nonprofit was able to carry a substantial amount of 
the logistical burden and its embedded organizational 
structures and very few everyday residents were engaged 
in the project beyond survey discussions with the primary 
researcher. Further study is needed to evaluate the 
strategy of engaging with other community organizations 
in the start-up of a GUC rather than directly with 
neighborhood residents. Furthermore, it has yet to be 
seen whether or not there will be long-term benefits from 
the PopUp15 project that trickle out to the community or, 
conversely, spur gentrification. 
There is also some risk that formalizing the GUC 
development process with a framework may decrease 
the landscape type’s e¥ectiveness as a resilient niche 
landscape phenomena. GUC projects oœen rely on 
subversive or advantageous tactics because of gaps 
in institutional oversight (Haydn and Temel, 2006). 
By formalizing the GUC development process with 
the intention of lowering barriers to implementation, 
institutional adoption of a GUC approval process may, 
paradoxically, create new barriers for stakeholders that 
otherwise would have been able to adopt a development 
approach rooted in the maxim that it is “better to ask for 
forgiveness than for permission.”
In addition to being correlated to the large-scale 
evolution of urban systems, the notion of resilience may 
also be applied to the scale of an individual landscape 
site. Individual resilient landscapes can be characterized 
as “those that adapt to volatile conditions while 
maintaining functional integrity” (Woodward, 2008). Not 
only is it asserted that the Framework proposed by this 
project can contribute to the resilience of urban systems, 
the “Spatial Sca¥old” is intended to maintain functional 
integrity of the GUC, intervening in a strategic way with 
minimal input. The framework and resultant site designs 
are adaptive, flexible, and responsive to disturbance, 
tying into greater discourse about urban resilience, CAS 
theory, and emergence theory as an operative metaphor 
for site design (Berrizbeitia, 2001; Spirn, 2012).
It is the researcher’s earnest hope that the contents of 
this project inspire someone to kick-start a GUC project 
in their own community. Regardless of how large or 
small the e¥ort may be, well-informed and good-natured 
action toward improving urban environments is likely to 
have positive e¥ects that ripple outwards and emerge in 
ways that exceed expectation.

147
APPENDIX
CAS and Urbanism Diagram
Barnett’s Six Hallmarks
XX
XX
A
B
APPENDIX A
CAS AND URBANISM DIAGRAM
148
This diagram, created by Sharon Wohl and Sean Wittmeyer, illustrates 
conceptual connections between aspects of CAS theory (center) and 
contemporary urban design theories (right). Direct connections between the 
characteristics  of emergence (leœ) and contemporary urban design theories 
(right) are highlighted in blue (n.d.).
149
Figure 7.1: CAS in Urbanism Diagram (Source: Sharon Wohl and Sean Wittmeyer, http://cas.seanwittmeyer.com/collection/urbanism)
I 
SCI~ rret I Ntlt«flherarch~s 
Non lin~ar/Htstork Processes 
Flows and tnterKUOf\S 
I 
150
APPENDIX B
BARNETT’S SIX HALLMARKS
“...hallmarks of a public space design that [takes] seriously 
the fundamental propositions of emergence” (Barnett 2013 
pp.203-205)
1. A “multitude of connections between environmental design and 
social outcome. The nature of this connectivity will be such that the 
emergent social phenomena would have an autonomous existence, 
and yet depend on the designed structures to enable and support 
them.”
a. People are “empowered to become involved in [the 
landscape’s] ongoing transformation”
b. “The higher-level properties of the designed landscape, such 
as its functionality, aesthetics, intelligibility, a¥ectuality, and 
a¥ordances, will supervene on the organizational conditions 
it provisions. These will include formulations of spatial 
elements, adaptability, accessibility and openness, and 
the articulation of material components such as surfaces, 
plants, water, sunlight, seating, as well as the relations 
between these.”
c. New types of occupation may emerge.
2. A “commitment to strong emergence.” In other words, “higher-level 
functioning in some way influences lower-level functioning.”
a. “Non-material features such as concepts, information and 
desires will have causal e¥ects in the material world of forces 
and particles, fish and insects...”
b. “Many levels of reality emerge in the world and the various 
objects and processes at each level have their own types of 
reality.”
c. “The logical relationships between ideas intermingle 
with the exchange of materials, physical connections and 
processual participation of nonhuman structures. As a 
result of this autocatalytic operationality, social and cultural 
responses would be able to cause new organizational and 
material arrangements, which in turn would permit a third 
feature of landscape architectural emergence...”
151
3. “...the appearance of novel social properties”
a. “Adaptive landscapes empower people to change them.”
b. “…people’s ability to make small changes to their 
environmental conditions can spiral upwards into dramatic 
revisions of social relationships.” Example: fruit trees along 
street – long-term change, vs. “sudden availability of a low-
rent retail premise for the use of a community organization” 
– immediate e¥ect.
4. “Assumption of local control over local conditions.”
a. “…attention on the emergence of small-scale shiœs in 
governance and management, and a commitment to 
currency and relevance rather than final result.”
b. “…reliance on short-term increments of transformation” 
occurring “within and against a background of groundswell 
long durée transformation.”
c. “The landscape architect will establish an initial set of 
conditions, based on a description of the situation that 
generates a process of realization.”
5. “…there will always be at least three types of simultaneously 
applicable explanation possible for any designed landscape.”
a. Bottom-up terms – access/egress, aesthetic and spatial 
qualities that respond to local context and engage cultural 
history
b. Same-level explanation – a diverse range of user groups that 
occupy the same space di¥erently
c. Top-down explanation – a landscape is the way it is because 
it was designed and guided by experts
6.  Urban landscapes are at once social systems and ecosystems, and 
“the landscape architect is responsible for a description of that 
situation”
a. The designer participates “in the situation su¥icient to 
develop the terms of the situation.”
b. “An emergentist landscape architect will combine techniques 
of reconnaissance and imaginative forensics in what Meyer 
calls situated ‘forms of notation.’”
c. “…the landscape architect is part of the system that is being 
designed…”

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