Drosscape: Wasting Land Urban America

by Alan Berger

Book Overview

Do you really know what is under that new house you just bought? How about what lies beneath the neighborhood playground? Was that "big box" retailer down your street built atop a toxic site? Will the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1568987137
• ISBN13: 9781568987132
• Release Date: May 2007
• Publisher: Princeton Architectural Press
• Length: 255 Pages
• Weight: 0.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 7.3" x 10.9"
• Grade Range: Grade 8 to Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

Eye Opening

It's a daunting, harrowing, yet strangely compelling photographic helicopter ride through the vast industrial and suburban backyards of the American landscape. Packed with informative, beautifully conceived graphs that collate reams of data, this book will fascinate those who fiercely love our brash and imperfect cities, and who retain hope for their ecological and transformational redemption in the coming century.

Great Read

This book is a natural extension of the direction Alan Berger took in his first book Reclaiming the American West. While in his first book he examined the "leftover" space, of human industrial development in the American West in his new book he examines the range of wasted spaces which are created by current urban development patterns. Although specifically about the American urban landscape, his work can be at least loosely applied anywhere where sprawl or horizontal urbanity has become the norm. A key aim of his book is to go beyond the partisan debate of pro-or anti sprawl activists. Instead, Berger sets out to initiate a conversation and to develop a vocabulary through which this phenomenon of "inevitable" horizontal development can be understood and critiqued. However, this is arguably one weakness of the book. Although he develops a wonderful analysis of the phenomenon, his acceptance of it's inevitably, especially in the face of the efforts of many to change the game, can come off as defeatist. Yet, his focus on the liminal nature of the typologies he outlines does open up many fascinating areas of discussion. For inspiration he draws on everything from William Gibson's Neuromancer to Lars Lerups' concept of Stim & Dross. Ultimately, his approach is hopeful though. He concludes that because of the large scale nature of the problem, any solution must draw on abilities and knowledge of all the design disciplines from landscape architecture to urban planning. Berger suggests a paradigm shift, asking "designers to consider working in the margins rather than at the center."

Surveying human needs, design challenges, and social issues alike.

DROSSCAPE: WASTING LAND IN URBAN AMERICA is a top pick not just for architects and building designers, but for any homeowners or buyer who would understand waste landscapes and how they are handled. Landscape architects must learn to accommodate them - and homeowners need to learn about them. DROSSCAPE is for both, offering a radical new method of thinking about landscape and its problems. Ten cities are analyzed through aerial photography, maps and charts with an eye to surveying human needs, design challenges, and social issues alike. Diane C. Donovan California Bookwatch

top drawer quality

If Dolores Hayden's recent exploration of suburban geography in "A Field Guide to Sprawl" defined a genre of 'naming and photographing' the oddness of the emerging American hinterland of strip malls, powercenters and waste space, Drosscape is its first major, major contribution. This thing is stunning.