Observing social-ecological design of permafrost landscapes: grounding urban planning in Utqiaġvik, Alaska

Abstract

How can Utqiaġvik develop new strategies of urban design on changing permafrost? Ongoing ethnographic analysis of the University of Virginia's project, "Understanding the Changing Natural-Built Landscape: An Integrated Urban Sensor Network in Utqiaġvik, AK," provides insight into how "design process" can help develop adaptive urban permafrost landscapes. Anthropological analysis of designers provides insight into how interdisciplinary practices create social-ecological change, and this paper builds on previous ethnographic work of the socio-political aspects of infrastructure and urban space. This UVA project uses design process, a collaborative approach common in architecture and other fields, in partnership with utilities and public services in Utqiaġvik, to co-develop relationships between urban planning, micrometeorological and ecological data, and permafrost. I analyze preliminary ethnographic observations of the cooperative dynamics of this project, including crossdisciplinary data collection structure, a "design studio" course's production of data-informed design proposals, developing discussions of water, snow, and thermal management, and input from community partners. Local residents have clear relationships of savvy renegotiation of the built environment, and snow removal maintenance emerged as a potential crux of designed change connecting hydrological data, ground temperatures, infrastructural impacts, and public services. Visualization of potential design solutions provides an accessible projection of possibilities for change that allow reconceptualization of relationships between city and permafrost. I argue that this project's work, as an iterative design process, integrates data, community experiences, and creative ideation. This integration allows Arctic urban residents and planners to redesign interactions with the land grounded in conceptions of permafrost as a social-ecological infrastructure and malleable architecture, potentially promoting senses of lived engagement with the changing land.