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Barakat Building : A Public Green Space
picture courtesy of al@mashriq http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/900/910/919/beirut/greenline/panoramas/big/pcd3721_13-23.jpg The Barakat building is located on what used to be the tramway station on...
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Urban Agriculture in Beirut
The world is urbanizing continuously and at a vast rate. The United Nations predicts that by 2030 more than half of the world population will be living in cities. About thirty five percent of...
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On the agency of designers:
Are designer’s only observers, autonomous creators, self interested professions, victims of the market or can they also be enablers, activists and resistive agents within their field? Through their...
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Beirut is ill: The WHOs 'Healthy City Networks'
Public Green Space in Developping citiesThe United Nations (1991) identifies that the number of people living in cities almost tripled in the world. More specifically it identifies that in developed...
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Illegality and informality clashes in Lebanon
Taken in 2005 by Sandra Rishani St. Simone Area“… [N]either cities nor places in them are unordered, unplanned; the question is only whose order, whose planning, for what purpose..." (Marcuse,...
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Food Security: Can global food production be increased?
In a day where the water tables are falling, the temperatures of the world are rising drastically, and the population continues to increase, our food production is facing eminent collapse. Moreover...
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Occupying the urban landscape: Burj-el-Murr
A serene sacred monolith stands still in Beirut’s continuously changing urban fabric. This 40 story unfinished tower dominates the skyline of down-town Beirut. The unfinished building is about 35 years...
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Behind “the pink house”
Around the Pink HouseI watched again one of my favorite Lebanese movies. For everyone that has not seen it yet pick up a copy or at-least read about it. This blog entry will discuss the movie, “Around...
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BASHOURA cemetery's airspace
Beirut maps highlighting cemetery location by an outline: Map1 1876 - Map2 1919- Map3 1964- Map4...
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Martyr square
Martyr square is a public square in downtown Beirut,Lebanon. Its history is the story of Lebanon, eventful and dramatic. The story of this square starts in the 1920s and today awaits in limbo.This...
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AIR-scape urbanism: Building Green 'Infrastructure'
In a previous blog entry ' Beirut is Ill' http://goo.gl/M33Bm we established that for Beirut to become a healthy city and achieve the 10m2/person of public green space required by the World Health...
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Water privatization in Lebanon
Mapping Lebanese RiversWater privatization touches on many intriguing and conflictual debates such as public versus economic good, monopolies, human rights and government failures in provision of...
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LET IT RISE
ATLANTIS source http://atlantis.haktanir.org/ch3.htmlThe idea of inhabiting the planets oceans and seas is a fascinating one that has been dealt with by designers and philosophers for centuries. Noah’s...
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READY FOR THE RISE
in1000 years a large part of Lebanon's coast will be under water The future of Lebanon’s coastal cities and their flood mitigation and sea rise plans are affected by two main things: 1- The constantly...
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URBAN HERITAGE AND ITS POLITICS :THE GRAND THEATER in Beirut
image by Caroline Tabet of Theater of Beirut ground, mezzanine and first floor seating from stage Our insistence to remember the value of heritage and the built environment has impelled us to continue...
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Vertical Towers of Green: Skyscrapers of Food in Beirut
In July, a show in Lebanon aired on TV, “Kalam el-Nas” on LBC that informed and documented the state of our food production quality in its varying processes. It seems we water our fruits and vegetables...
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MIXED TENURE : "بناية الأشباح “ The Ghosts Building"
Walking around Hamra today and seeing the new and under construction building stock I feel that we have already lost the social and economic heterogeneity in Hamra. Today the building stock is made up...
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Revolt Against Bladders Leash
Your Public right to a Public Toilet"A nation is judged by its toilets, it's one of the first images tourists and visitors get and we should generally be ashamed in this country" stated Greed when...
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Get me out of this Traffic Jam
BUILT UP FABRIC VERSUS STREET SCAPE NOTE AMOUNT OF SPACE WASTED ON CAR INFRASTRUCTUREIf you have tried to drive within or towards Beirut and ended up spending double or triple the amount of time, it...
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Waad Delivers a Reconstructed HARET HREIK
I recently drove around Haret Hreik and I would like to report that most if not all of it is rebuilt. In a paper, I once tackled the reconstruction process of Haret Hreik, so part of the following are...
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