Okowai : a study in hillside residential development

Abstract

A residential area is home for most people. It is also a social unit of individual and community. Residential environments are what most people, for a large part of their lives, see, experience and live. It is a refuge from work in office or factory, a place for children's education and play, for parents, for old people. The residential fabric is a place of life - it is man's environment.

Man's living environment is so fundamental that it is often taken for granted and in doing so, abused. Man's living needs are many. So is the landscapes, for it, also, is a living thing. The opportunities to cater for these needs in the creation of a residential area, are many and varied but requires a recognition of their existence and value to realise their full potential. Without this recognition, planners and designers are still shaping people by shaping their environments but in ignorance to the many needs of people and often at the cost of a satisfactory community: Hall says "both man and his environment participate in moulding each other", but what sort of people are we creating in these environments of Porirua East?

This study is concerned with people and the land they will live on. The first section takes an overview of the living environment - an understanding of people and their living needs (which can be expressed in both conscious and unconscious desires and satisfied in both tangible and abstract form), the design principles of suburban areas, and a brief look at the problems and benefits of developing a hillside site, related to the Porirua/Wellington area in particular. The second section deals with a site that has been zoned residential, understanding it as a functioning, living landscape that can only successfully accept development with as little disturbance as possible to its basic needs.