New Aged: Augmented Superimpositions

Abstract

Society is evolving towards an ageing population. The future of this generation is compromised due to the previous generation spending all its savings and resources. As people are living much longer and healthier than before, retirement will soon be the thing of the past. The population in developed countries are increasingly aging, with the baby boomer generation turning 85 in 2031. On the other hand, we have a society which is evolving towards being more and more urbanized. The United Nation states by the year 2031, the projected number of people living in urbanized towns and cities is five billion. In 2031, 89% of New Zealand's total population will live in urban areas. Taking the two trends of an ageing population and an increasingly urbanized society, the conception of urban spaces need to be re-evaluated and re-thought. The existing relationship between the aged population and the urban fabric is ambivalent. The city has always been a theatre of unique forms of aggregation but simultaneously also of particular forms of social segregation. The effect of the increasing density of the city's fabric have produced in itself a polarized spatial structure which favors spatial privatization. This spatial structure which is economically driven has produced within itself a social inequality which favors the economically active demographic and sidelines the ageing population which are not economically active anymore. Furthermore, the decay in social life caused by privatized urban developments has produced an environment which hampers a healthy ageing process. As the world undergoes population ageing, the aged are ceasing to be the byproducts of a cultural mainstream but are instead changing the very nature of mainstream society. There are two possible scenarios. The first being the aged becoming urban isolates, ceasing to be an integral part of society. Retirement villages are not an option anymore because of the isolating effect and consequent neglect of social wealth of which the aged population are. Not only that, the existing model is a form of suburbia incarnate which gratifies the suburban lifestyle. The second involves the aged as social wealth where they become urban resources, living libraries and knowledge banks, enabling them to contribute towards subcultural formations and the enrichment of urban communities while remaining useful and socially integrated. Moving from the first scenario to the second is not an option but the approaching reality. Using the site as the inception of design investigation, the thesis explores the conditions and spatial constructs of high density verticality within the context of the modern city. Different methods of utilizing spaces within the site's existing spatial structures are investigated to form an adaptive proposal and explore the primary question of: How can the ageing population be spatially and socially reintegrated into high density urban fabric, allowing them to be an active contribution to society?