Professionals’ knowledge and use of environmental assessment in an architectural competition

In early design phases, architects, landscape architects and urban planners are key actors whose decisions determine the environmental impact of planning and building projects. Environmental and sustainability assessment tools for buildings and neighbourhoods have been developed to promote sustainable building, but their usage has not been thoroughly evaluated. This study investigated self-reported knowledge and usage of such tools among competitors and jury group from 10 European countries involved in the international architectural competition ‘A New City Centre for Kiruna’ in Sweden. The questionnaire revealed that 13% used environmental assessment tools or management systems in the competition, although 47% had used them previously. Tool users reported greater knowledge of how to handle environmental impacts than non-users. However, the self-rated experience of handling various environmental impacts, in the competition and in general, was low for both groups. Nevertheless, the self-rated importance of environmental impacts was high among all participants. Based on this study, it is concluded that environmental assessment tools, issues and goals can be better integrated into the processes of early design in planning and building projects, and in architectural competitions. Furthermore, to limit environmental impacts in building and planning projects, professionals need to be educated about environmental strategies and solutions.     

Guidance of students＇ subconsciousness in architectural design

文章从建筑设计思维本源的论述开始,提出并深入分析了学生的建筑潜意识设计思维概念,提倡教师在教学过程中要引导低年级学生培养建筑潜意识设计思维,并对如何正确引导低年级学生建筑潜意识设计思维的教学途径及方法提出了设想和建议。     

Strengths and Weaknesses of the Planning Profession in China

China, as a developing nation, has therare success of maintaining the balance be-tween its rural and urban population toabout 80% and 20%, although the urbanpopulation has actually increased 130%since 1949, which is greater than the increaseof the national population (Zou, 1986).With its modernization effort and theliberalization of the economy, there aregreat demands for additional and improvedproduction space and efficient productionconditions, as well as demands for a betterliving environment which includes housing     

Spatial Distribution and Typology of High-Tech Parks in China

ＳｐａｔｉａｌＤｉｓｔｒｉｂｕｔｉｏｎａｎｄＴｙｐｏｌｏｇｙｏｆＨｉｇｈ－ＴｅｃｈＰａｒｋｓｉｎＣｈｉｎａＧｕＣｈａｏｌｉｎ（ＩｎｓｔｉｔｕｔｅｏｆＧｅｏｇｒａｐｈｙ，ＣｈｉｎａＡｃａｄｅｍｙｏｆＳｃｉｅｎｃｅ）ＩｎｔｒｏｄｕｃｔｉｏｎＴｈｅｈｉｇｈ...     

Hillsong and “megachurch” practice: semiotics,spatial logic and the embodiment of contemporary evangelical protestantism

ABSTRACT

“Megachurches” are congregations with a weekly attendance of at least 2000, by one definition and that have been established recently—many of them since the 1980s—in a variety of countries including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, South Korea, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand. They are often distinguished and distinguish themselves, from older (including other large) churches by a number of characteristics: a contemporary worship style prominently featuring electronic musical instruments and media, dynamic and charismatic speakers, services geared towards “seekers” rather than mature believers, international links and networks, informality in dress and atmosphere. Megachurches are also commonly congregations dominated by relatively young and well-educated members. Beyond these similarities, the term “megachurch” really covers a wide range of denominational, doctrinal, socioeconomic, linguistic-cultural, branding/image and organizational differences. Scholarly and public opinion has accordingly been strongly divided on the position, values and practices of megachurches. Referring closely to the internationally renowned Australian megachurch, Hillsong, this paper attempts to arrive at an analytical framework for megachurches based on a pragmatic and cognitive approach to megachurch semiotics and spatial practice, in the process defining the megachurch as one which seeks to materialize some of the intangibles of the Christian experience, while foregrounding practices of size and presence.     

How architectural drawings work — and what that implies for the role of representation in architecture

A distinction between imaginative and notational use of architectural drawings is introduced. The case of Mies's Brick Country House is used to suggest that drawings in the imaginative mode are often architectural works in their own right, and that they can function as works by invoking a special mode of visual attention. Such an attention is essentially an act of visual representation or depiction, in that it involves sustained perceptual parsing of the drawing in terms of objects or figures that are not literally present but are still responsive to propositional thought. It is further shown, with the help of some recent work in philosophy, cognitive science and art criticism, how such a representational mode of viewing drawings leads to an imaginative engagement that is the hallmark of an aesthetic experience. It is finally suggested that such a potency of depictive representation has been exploited through history, not just in making presentational drawings, but in the visual design of buildings as well. The purpose of representation, thus, is not so much to use an artefact — say a building — to state a proposition, but rather to help to give it a perceptual structure that can sustain imaginative engagement.     

On “Critical Period Hypothesis” and demonstrate the irrationality of English learning begins in the Early Childhood in China

This paper first introduces the “Critical Period Hypothesis”(CPH) in L2 acquisition and the view of its supporters. However, it raised the opposite views from many other scholars and made them using th...     

Urban land expansion and the floating population in China: For production or for living?

There is a large amount of population moved from countryside to cities in China during its urbanization in the past two decades. The majority of these people have no formal qualifications for city residency, and they are so-called ‘floating population’. The increase of this group of people has induced the pressure of land use in cities, and the contradiction between the demand and the supply of urban land has been intensifying particularly in those developed regions in China. This paper examines the impacts of floating population on urban land by presenting the interrelations between floating population and urban land expansion from the perspective of production land and living land. Structural equation model (SEM) is employed in conducting the analysis. The result shows that the floating population alone does not have direct effect on urban land expansion, but have indirect impacts through engaging in the production or living process. It is particularly interesting that floating people's living conditions have no direct positive effect on the increase of construction land. Based on the research results, suggestions are offered for improvements in government policy towards a more sustainable and integrated urbanization, including the provision of housing support, the formation of more urbanized society and sustainable development.     

Contention for urban state space and the rise of society in China: A case study of “housing planting” in Hohhot

Existing literature has overemphasized the power of state in the theorization of China's urbanization and transition, and after the reform and opening-up, substantial attention has been given to the interaction between state and market. Comparatively, the role of society has been vastly underestimated. The paper selects housing planting in Hohhot to explain how local villagers contended actively with local states for and over space to increase compensation for land requisition. The contention has caused severe social conflicts, high compensation cost, and forced demolition, thereby threatening local states' land finance and development. Essentially, space has become a useful tool for citizens to preserve their interests. This implies that with the rise of society, China's urbanization is transitioning from a high-speed and low-cost stage to a high-quality and high-cost stage. Due to the changing relation between state, capital, and society, many pertinent institutions need to be adjusted as well. The paper calls for additional attention to the state-society-relation perspective when theorizing China's urban development.     

Composition and reaction mechanism of cement–asphalt mastic

In order to improve the performance of asphalt concrete under heavy traffic, cement as reinforcement is used to mix with emulsified asphalt in asphalt mastic. But cement and emulsified asphalt is hard to mix well. Thus, F-type superplasticizer (FSP) as the isolation layer outside the micelles in cationic emulsified asphalt (CEA) is used in cement asphalt mastic (CAM). Emulsified asphalt and cement can mix effectively without the generation of any viscosity by demulsification. Sodium carboxymethylcellulose (CMC-Na) is added to improve and restrain settlement and stratification of the mixed mastic. This study is to investigate the effects and reaction mechanisms associated with mixing FSP and CMC-Na into cement–asphalt mastic.     

“Social capitalism” in renewable energy generation: China and California comparisons

With a population of over 1.3 billion people, demand for renewable energy is expected to grow to a USD $12 billion market in the near term. Under Renewable Energy Law (REL) in February 2005 in the People's Republic of China (PRC) passed by the National Congress, renewable energy projects will be able to receive a range of financial incentives starting in 2006, which will more than double the PRC current renewable energy generation from 7% to 15% by 2020. Most of the increase will be in hydroelectric generated power. Nonetheless, the nation and especially the provinces are moving rapidly to develop a wide range of renewable energy generation including solar, wind, geothermal and run of the river.Because China practices “social capitalism” as expressed in it's recurrent Five Year National Plans since 1999, the national government and all the provinces have programs, unlike many western and industrialized nations, to “plan” and provide for infrastructures. This paper concerns only the energy infrastructure sector and renewable energy generation in particular. The planning process includes financial incentives and investments which are a major part of the Chinese law focused on “encouraging foreign investment industries”. The key part of the law is to guarantee long-term power purchase agreements with state owned and controlled “utilities”. In short, China may have gotten the economics of the energy sector correct in its concern for planning and finance.The paper develops these energy infrastructure ideas along with the legal and financial requirements as “lessons” learned from the USA and especially California. These lessons now apply to China and allow it to learn from the American mistakes. Empirical data will be drawn from work done in China that examine the renewable energy generation and infrastructures and hence allow the RPC and its Provinces to “leap frog ”the mistakes of other developed nations. Further lessons will be learned from provinces and related infrastructures in China, such as water, transportation, environment, waste and telecommunications. More significantly, the USA and western industrialized nations may now learn from the Chinese.     

Brigter Nights in Cities of China

Thanks to the growth of urban lighting sys-tern,nights in China's cities are becomingbrighter.By the end of 1991,there were al-together 1.25 million road lamps in largeand medium-sized cities across thecountry,while before 1949 only a limited     

Environmental values and attitudes among farmers in China – a case study in the watershed of Yuqiao reservoir of Tianjin Municipality,China

Failure to curb water pollution in China brings to the fore the issue of environmental values and attitudes among Chinese farmers. Applying the New Ecological Paradigm Scale this study finds that the pro-environmental value of New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) Worldview has a stronger standing among the studied Chinese farmers than the Dominant Social Paradigm (DSP) Worldview.     

Reprint of “The production of segregated urban landscapes: A critical analysis of gated communities in Sofia”

Gated communities represent a rather new trend in housing in Sofia. Besides very few secluded and privately governed neighbourhoods of the nomenclature they were little known in Bulgaria before 1989. This has changed profoundly over the last 15 years. Indeed, similar to other Central and Eastern European cities (CEE) one can speak of a boom in closed-type settlements in Sofia and its outskirts with approximately 50–60 newly constructed gated and guarded housing estates which in some cases accommodate several hundred inhabitants. While this growth of enclosed high-income neighbourhoods has mostly been studied in terms of architectural design, representation, residential structure and behaviour as well as public–private dichotomy little attention has been paid to the politico-economic processes underlying this radical restructuring of urban space in Central and Eastern Europe. Additionally the role of the key stakeholders (local business people, international developers, public authorities) has hardly been questioned. Therefore, this article tries to uncover the interplay of different stakeholders that have shaped this production of space. By applying a relational approach the article attempts to elaborate on why, by whom and by what kind of practices gated communities are produced and how they function. Beyond that the article also takes a closer look at the neo-liberal urban policy environment that has influenced the rise in gated communities. The article aims not only to extend the research by adding just another case study, but rather to provide a critical reading of gated communities in Central and Eastern Europe. Furthermore by discussing three examples of gated communities in Sofia, each representing a specific type with its specific causalities and socio-spatial outcomes, the article will also highlight what we can learn from our post-socialist Bulgarian case regarding gated communities in general.     

Relations Between the Industrial Output and the Size of Cities in China

Currently, there are controversies onthe development policy for large, mediumand small sized cities. To appraise the ad-vantages and disadvantages of cities of vari-ous sizes from different angles, conclusionscan vary tremendously. Starting from devel-opment productivity, cities in China shouldaim at achieving good output returns. This article tries to discuss the outputreturns of cities of different size from two     

Application and Program Composition of the Virtual Laminated 3 Dimensional Degenerated Element in the Bridge Structure

The text include two aspects, one is the general finite element method (FEM), the other is bridge special FEM. And two viewpoints are used in it, one is the theory of FEM, the other is the practical program-making. The virtual laminated 3 dimensional degenerated element with vivid character is introduced in this paper and a large-scale computer program of FEM is manufactured. 1In addition, some current advantaged computer technology is used to make simple pre- and post processing program in order to exemplify and calculate easily in the process of researching. By using a factual example, the text also prove the method simply and resultful for analyze of bridge.     

Review and Exploration of the Development of Planning for the Conservation of the Famous Historical and Cultural Cities in China

To comprehend the development of the famous histori-cal and cultural cities in China and their conservation plan-ning, it is necessary to understand, first of all, the back-ground of their history and present condition. This back-ground has taken shape in the historic development of thecities and is influenced by many complicated factors of thepresent time. To discuss these factors in simple way, theycan be summarized as follows:The impact of the historical and cultural ideas;The impact of the physical and environmental condi-tion;The impact of the present socialand economicsituation.The impact of the historical and cultural ideasChina is a country with ancient civilization. TheChinese cultural has been shaped through development, in-heritance and harmony in a history of 5000 years on the ba-sis of the ancient Huaxia Culture with the Yellow River andthe Yangtse River as the main arteries.The rising of ancient cities in China can be traced backto over 3500 years ago. China is a multinational country. Int