PLAYABLE GROUNDS - playground as infrastructure for a city

PLAYABLE GROUNDS is proposed to enhance the walkability in a city by introduction of “playgrounds for public”- an integration of playgrounds and existing city fabrics without any fundamental urban structures changes. The “playgrounds” are injected in the high density city at different levels as an essential elements to promote playability and walkability, hence bringing health and benefits to citizens by strengthening social sustainability of their city. In recently years, societies are paying increasing attention to “walkability” of a city. In Korea, the government implements policies to improve the walkability in Seoul in 2014. In Hong Kong, an organization conducts a study of walkability in Hong Kong, which shows that the walkability in Hong Kong still has rooms for improvement. Unlike many of the pedestrian friendly cities in Europe, where cycling paths and pedestrian roads are carefully planned, Hong Kong and other similar metropolitan cities are far below the standard of being “walkable”. Central district in Hong Kong has been selected as the site of this thesis. Being a central business district (CBD) in Hong Kong, this site is full of challenges and potentials. An comprehensive walkability study will be conducted to address the major issues regarding pedestrian unfriendly design, corresponding design intervention will then be introduced to the CDB in order to enhance the pedestrian experience. Existing pedestrian network, footbridge, sidewalk, pocket park, elevated escalator and left-over space are the vacancy sites for injection of energy to the city. This thesis aims to explore the possibilities of how architectural interventions could actually enhance pedestrian experience by introducing “playground” as an augmented infrastructure - hence the increase of the walkability in the city without intensively changing the existing city infrastructure