4: People and Lifestyles and Future Scenario Development

Thinking of architecture as the set in which characters play out their lives within different scenes is a really interesting approach, and lead to some interesting project developments for our group. When asked to develop characters to inform our architectural possibilities, our group was forced to go back and re-evaluate our proposed scenario to examine what part these characters could play, and how they would be impacted.

We decided to create a rough timeline of events leading to our proposed scenario, not only to create a feasible and justified ‘future’, but to see what major events could impact our characters, and therefore their experience of any architectural outcomes. We ended our event timeline at 2030, but estimated that in 2042 the architecture would have been produced to reflect these tumultuous changes (which is when our proposed scenario will technically be held).

Timeline of events leading from today to the date of our proposed scenario.

In creating this timeline we realised that we needed to clarify who our corporate sponsors would be, as they would have a great impact on our character’s experiences, and also the future architectural approach in Brisbane. We started by brainstorming not only who the most influential and successful businesses of today are, but also how they could contribute to Brisbane as a sponsor. We then rationalised that Brisbane would most likely accept several tender bids, as no one sponsor could ‘sustainably’ support the city, and no one would put all their eggs in one corporate basket. We therefore decided that the most logical (and exciting) sponsors would be:

• McDonalds - providing the city with food, health support (through the Ronald McDonald House), child care and recreational infrastructure.
• Samsung – providing the city with advancements in technology.
• IKEA – providing the city with home/office wares, accommodation (with their new investment in hotels) and construction innovations.
• P&G – providing the city with drugs, health supplements and cosmetics.
• GE – providing the city with energy (we must convert to alternative sources due to the mining bust), and further technological advancements.

These five companies would provide monetary and services support to the flailing city of Brisbane, and in return have a say in local town planning actions, in order to ensure their support through exclusivity (rather like London during the Olympics). The political structure of Australia would appear run as per usual, with the rest of our governmental systems having control over corporations. However, we believe that the corporations would eventually end up calling the shots; by placing “democratically elected representatives” within the upper and lower house, the companies could constantly influence federal, state and local legislation, thus creating the illusion of governmental control.

Distribution of Power over Brisbane (perceived and reality)

Town planning control over Brisbane:
The "Big 5" have 100% control over inner CBD,
but only voting power over greater Brisbane area.

In creating the characters that are ‘acting’ within our proposed scenario, we realised they would be impacted by this political shift in four key areas: Work, Live, Play and Invest, as these are the four elements that construct the social dynamic of Brisbane’s CBD. As a group we have experience in working, living and playing in Brisbane, but not so much that of investing, a dynamic that will change dramatically in our proposed scenario of privatising Brisbane. We therefore wanted to have four characters that represented these unique dynamics:

1. The corporate sponsor – this character has a positive outlook on the proposed scenario (and the events leading towards it), as he has an invested interest in the outcome. He sees the changes as financial and political genius and believes that he is saving Brisbane, turning a blind-eye to any social or environmental concerns.
2. The political activist – this character has a negative outlook on future events, aware of the underlying dangers of corporate sponsorship and the ‘conspiracy theories’ underlying it. She is against companies having so much power over a city and is a strong protester.
3. The permanent resident – this character has had to adapt to what has happened to Brisbane, and sees the changes only in how it has impacted his day-to-day life. He has worked and lived in Brisbane’s CBD during the entire process, but is mostly unaware of the ‘behind the curtain’ dealings.
4. The next generation – this character is content with how Brisbane has changed given she doesn’t know any different. She has lived her entire life within Brisbane’s new corporate structure, so she therefore sees no evil in how the world has changed around her.

Each team member was assigned a character to develop, so that we can each understand a unique perspective within our future scenario, so we can identify and demonstrate the architectural possibilities.

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