ARCHITECTURE DESIGN PROJECT

Introduction:

The proposed site for this project is located within Kuala Lumpur urban area, whereas it also acts as a serious source of environmental and social issues. As a result, this urban area that is congested with many high rise buildings and shoplots are lacking of enough breathing spaces that are capable of becoming contact points for the community of the area. In addition, the amount of green space per person today in Kuala Lumpur is only 12 square meters, in which it has has fallen below the WHO standards of 16 square meters per person. Besides, one of the most significant river in Kuala Lumpur, the Gombak River has been seriously polluted due to this urban development. However, there is a River of Life (ROL) project driven by a Joint Development Council (JDC) sponsored by the Minister for Federal Territories and Urban Wellbeing, and coordinated by DBKL with an objective to revitalise the two iconic rivers which are the 10.7km of Gombak River and Klang River. In parallel, the National Sewerage Department, Department of Irrigation and Drainage and DBKL have performed detailed studies on the river cleanup exercise to improve the water quality from its current Class III (defined as unsafe for body contact) to Class IIB (defined as safe for recreational use with body contact). On the other hand, unbalanced social classes under economic forces causes social problem such as crimes, homelessness and poverty, resulting in confined community groups that only stay within their own zones. Therefore, the proposed project of urban farming is aimed to promote the green awareness, in order to increase the amount of green space per person, while at the same time enhancing the participation and engagement between the communities on site.

Aims and Objectives:

Urban farming is proposed in this project with the objectives of responding to both the environmental and social issues caused by the rapid urban development of the area, by increasing the amount of green space per person, while at the same time, enhancing the communal participation and engagement of the area. Besides, this project also aims to improve the liveability of the area by creating a more comfortable environment and providing spaces for healthy recreational activities. In addition, this project targets to set up an important platform that promotes and shares the knowledge of urban farming with the communities, in order to increase the percentage of farming which is also the amount of green space per person in the urban area. On the other hand, this project also aims to integrate with the ROL project and become one of the node along the Gombak River that aims to revitalise the rivers and so to create a green corridor within the urabn setting that connects the existing open spaces, rivers or heavily trees areas radiating from the city.