Arts Thread

Allison Slomski
master of architecture

tulane university

Graduates: 2024

Specialisms: Architecture / Sustainable Design / Landscape / Garden Design

My location: New Orleans, United States

allison-slomski ArtsThread Profile
tulane university

Allison Slomski

allison-slomski ArtsThread Profile

First Name: Allison

Last Name: Slomski

University / College: tulane university

Course / Program: master of architecture

Graduates: 2024

Specialisms: Architecture / Sustainable Design / Landscape / Garden Design

My Location: New Orleans, United States

About

allison is a trained architectural designer with a keen eye for the larger processes of landscape and ecology as they influence, and are in turn influenced by, human-made projects. as the compounding climate crises drive urbanized areas to increasingly shoulder greater environmental hazards, thoughtful methods of spatial design, planning, and construction must be harnessed to reconcile human needs with greater natural processes. architecture can no longer merely be considered an object on a parcel of land, but rather one of many actors in an ecological system.

insistent processes: Strategies for socio-ecological cohabitation on the working waterfront

As cities around the world face the compounded challenges of climate change, the redevelopment of their post-industrial waterfronts has become a straightforward opportunity to implement new climate resilience strategies, particularly through "green infrastructure." The general lack of inclusion of industrial processes in climate resilience planning, compounded by their local-regional economic importance, makes them particularly vulnerable to climate hazards. The thesis, using one Philadelphia's port terminals as a case study, proposes the reconceptualization of an industrial waterfront area as an "eco-industrial ward," a park-like management system that balances industrial, ecological, and civic needs with green infrastructure strategies. Through adaptive, collaborative monitoring and maintenance processes backed by private-public partnership, the eco-industrial ward is intended to improve public access to the Delaware Riverfront, combine environmental remediation and ecological restoration with flood mitigation strategies, and preserve (and potentially enhance) the economic performance of industrial site actors. Ideally, this cohabitative strategy would be applied to Philadelphia’s other working waterfronts, and become a replicable design process transferable to other cities.