Framing urban autopoiesis: street as a track for multiple adaptive cycles

Résumé 0

Street is the elementary domain of urban complex systems adaptation. It frames all phases of urban evolution, as they can be described by an adaptive cycle conceptual model: a forward loop, including growth and conservation phases, and a back loop, covering release, or crisis, and a reorganization phase. Urban dynamics are not composed of a unique adaptive cycle, as cities evolve through multiple ones, having different timescales, as well as many periods and durations. The whole of these cycles, deployed on and in streets, unfold street rhythms, which present time is the synchronic representation. This communication will address multiple adaptive cycles intertwining in street life, identifying three main paths: (i) urban fabric forming process; (ii) ground level uses; (iii) public space appropriations, ephemeral occupations and activities. Diachronic analysis of each path is carried out on the main case study of one street in Rabat, Morocco. It will be discussed by investigating change drivers and mechanisms, adaptation figures and resources, evolutionary phases and rhythms, persistence layouts. The main goal is to figure out street evolutions dynamics and parameters in the framework of autopoiesis concept, as well as to highlight the role played by street in framing urban autopoiesis.