Above, a piece ofAlexander's design for the Amazon site, commisioned by the University of Oregon, intended to enhance the sense ofcommunity often found in student hou.~ing. The urban village could also demonstrate that sturdy, sensiti~e, high-quality multi-unit dwellings, ofa kind rarely found in the US today, can be builtfor the same price 8R as standard dormitories or motels. Below, the floor plan for one ofthe Agate street - prototypes ofthe Amazon housing, with studies, windowseats and alcoves for.the benefit of students. Page 18 RAIN Summer 1994 Volume XIV, Number 4 <; campus committees. When there are problems, users are sometimes considered a burden, and viewed ·.., with suspicion, by planners. ·Alexander's concern is that "people who are treated as a potential danger, with a combination of I<ld gloves and repression, are not going to be natural and .helpful participants in anything." Unfortunately for the · .Experiment's designer, he returned to campus to build an unwant~d project. Years ago the University left construction of student housing to the marketplace, due mostly to pressure by loc.al landlords. But the State of : Oregon issued direction to build significant new housing anyway, in the hope that this would lower rent$ in the tight Eugene housing market. ·By law, this housing must be built with government bonds, that is, borrowed money. This meant that the new rents would be close to market rates, since they would essentially include.mortgage payments. The State's orders cre~ted among administrators an ideological dilemma, since they · didn't want to further penetrate· the housing market, and a practical one, since they had no confidence in their ability to fill housing at regular rents. These quandaries burdened every aspect of the project. Despite the Experiment's call for open discussion, none of this was aired publicly. Administrators hoped to smooth over problems and get on with the building assignment. Officials don't really see the Experiment as something that constrai~s them: it's for architects and users, no? Somehow, blow-ups over past projects had not'shaken them into worry about their process. Though the administration is responsible for its general lack of planning insight, it's only partly t9 blame for the particular tumult that was to come over housing. The extreme behaviors of the University in this matter, which were to include shuffling user group members, breaking . arbitration, and altering signed contracts, came ultimately from the State mandate to build..Force an µnwilling institution to do anything difficult, e,ven to help poor tenants, and its fragile democracy is bound to crack. Alexander couldn't know any of this was about to happen. He simply geared up for a challenging project. He braced the University with encouragement: they could indeed build student housing at costs competitive with the market, especially in the long term. Not only 'that, but the
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