7.1.1 Macrocosms in Microcosms: Towards Trichotomous Perspectives

In contrast to Jeremy Bentham’s ‘Pannomion’, which a “single code” was intended to be “all-comprehensive” in its application (Huge, 2004, p.5), thus advocating a ‘one- size fits all’ environmental and social scenarios codification approach, the findings of this study assert that not one, but three code variants are appropriate to the environmental, therein fire behaviours as can became manifest within the wildland urban interface. Thus, this tri-part pangenical paradigm and the architectural and urban design practice and codes born therefrom are, in effect, the inverse of Bentham’s. But, born of an era endowed with ever-expanding and evolving means of evaluating real, short, and increasingly long-term environmental possibilities, the Panarchitectural genera and the codes that establish the parameters within which its various ‘species’ develop, accommodates for such expanse of information as was far beyond Bentham’s reach.

While, currently, the NFDRS’s several fire-monitoring indices have limited predictive capacity, both terrestrial and space environmental monitoring systems are evolving apace. Research needs, such as the creation of wireless integrated sensor networks (Kremens et al, 2010), and “the development of a greater number of remotely sensed metrics” to be used in the assessment of fuel-state change (Smith et al, 2014, p. 322) are increasingly met. For example, organisations including ESA, NASA, USGS, and Planet Labs, are among a burgeoning number that provide open access satellite imagery. Currently, several such satellites and aerial sensors are utilised for monitoring wildfire-related activity worldwide (Herawati et al, 2015). Their capabilities include detecting active wildfires, mapping burn-scars, and assessing biomass state [NOAA’s Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR); Landsat’s multispectral, thermal, and panchromatic banded fleet [Fig. 78], and Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [Fig. 79]; Bispectral and Infrared Remote Detection (BIRD)]; and fuel availability and flammability [RapidEye multispectral systems; Airborne Visible Infra-Red Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS); Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER); MODIS/ASTER Airborne Simulator (MASTER); and, the first to gather public access high resolution imagery, IKONOS]. Researchers, such as Pierre Markuse, of whom works are featured throughout this thesis, digitally process such imagery to reveal data, which other researchers then utilise in their analysis of the wildfires and their aftermaths in near-to-real-time. Indeed, in response to several recent wildfire complexes, Planet Labs’ (planet.com) disaster response team mobilised one of their high-resolution [scale 5m>] RapidEye fleet, thereon immediately released the imagery under an open CC-BY-SA license.

Bringing a sense of scale to the sum of the satellite imagery now available, CA start- up Descartes Labs (descarteslabs.com) provide access to 5 million gigabytes [and growing] of data. Simultaneously, advances in the analysis of landscape-scale data, including artificial intelligence systems that rapidly process satellite and other imagery, and in wildfire modelling and simulation, such as the National Institute of Science and Technology’s Wildland-Urban Interface Fire Dynamics Simulation, take ‘panoptical’ potentialities to a new level, as do technological advancements more generally. For example, increasingly advanced, yet accessible home-weather stations enable citizens to monitor temperature, humidity, heat index, wind speed and gust, and more (Celestron, 2018). Though not as sophisticated as government agency run remote automatic weather stations, the data that can be extrapolated therefrom is valuable, for it, together with ocular and other in-situ observations can be aggregated and analysed by diverse members of the research, policy, and business community. Further ways in which citizen gathered information can inform real-time wildfire response and research includes analysis of social media activity, as exemplified by Haze Gazer, which is an app that analyses Twitter-user activity to help track the spread of wildfire smoke, thus inform which communities are at risk of respiratory and other health problems (Hazegazer.org, 2017). Hence, regardless of cuts to U.S. government-funded wildfire research and some affiliated budgets (Philipps, 2017), combinatory factors are enabling such “real-time decision support” and “cross boundary communication” as was recommended by the scientific advisors to the Obama administration (Holdren et al, 2015).

As discussed earlier, fire-adaptation in plant genera is dependent on functional traits that enable them to track an array of cyclical, and other environmental changes, including wildfire’s presence, passing, intensities, and severities. The above referenced sensing, actuating, analysis and communications technologies are representative of pre-existing monitoring modes that could be integrated into architectures and urban design of a trichotomous Panarchistic kind. However, vulnerable to hacking and other acts of privacy infringement, by means of mitigating the possibility of their unintentionally contributing to the creation of a Benthamian citizen surveillance device, countermeasures, and upgrades thereof, would be required ad infinitum. But, ours [humans] are not the only means of environmental monitoring.

>Continue to Chapter 7.1.2 here.

The thesis is also available in PDF format, downloadable in several parts on Academia and Researchgate.

Note that figures have been removed from the digital version hosted on this site, but are included in the PDFs available at the links above.

Citation: Sterry, M. L., (2018) Panarchistic Architecture: Building Wildland-Urban Interface Resilience to Wildfire through Design Thinking, Practice and Building Codes Modelled on Ecological Systems Theory. PhD Thesis, Advanced Virtual and Technological Architecture Research [AVATAR] group, University of Greenwich, London.