Charette Reflection – Megan Bonner

Constraints

It was difficult to adjust to the two week time period. To feel like we were on top of things, I feel like things had to be made right away, which didn’t give us much time for ideating and research, and that can lead to uncertainty and a lack of confidence in the overarching idea. My group didn’t really go along with the idea given to us, so that in itself is a constraint since we had to build a new idea from the ground up and we didn’t have any time for that. Working with a group for this project was difficult. I generally don’t do well in group projects anyway, but I felt that the number of people in the group affected the cohesiveness of the final deliverable. Like, it was hard for 5 people to get on the same page and organize in a way that was productive. I feel like the project would have gone smoother if there were 3, or even 4, instead of 5 people. This project overall, made me feel very exhausted.

Opportunity

For the future, I will try to be more active a group and make sure there’s an open communication between members. A lot of stress can occur when there’s not an agreement on what’s being made or even if there’s a misunderstanding of a topic. In the future, I’d like to settle on a topic at the very beginning and not waver in my confidence of that topic, instead of re-hashing the same idea over and over again. I will also allow myself to be reliant on people and trust in my group members more.

Application

Working in a group makes me feel motivated to do a project, even if it’s a stress-induced motivation. I get in a headspace where I don’t want to disappoint my group or be that person that doesn’t pull their weight. So, I tried my best in adding my contributions to a team. Focus and productivity were kind of a rollercoaster since my group spent a lot of time on the research and analysis. Sometimes I feel like my group got to a bit of a stand-still where we were just trying to figure out what we’re doing, instead of making something. To be honest, I feel like we had a hard time agreeing on things and that stagnated our process. Although I think using everyone’s different skills in the end deliverable was beneficial, because everyone had something to offer. We probably could have made something more polished if we started earlier in the charette.

Presentation & Contribution

For my group, I filmed video footage with Julia. I edited and produced the final video, including the opening animation. I provided the voice over, going off of Julia’s script. I also designed the poster series, based off of Ashley’s brand.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B03PGHrHU2LkSEdSMU5ielh6czQ?usp=sharing

Raleigh River Walk

Many Neighborhoods, One Community

Jack, Julia, Nicole, Ashley, & Megan

Statement of Purpose: Rather than emphasizing the idea of a unified social collective, our initiative aims to amplify and celebrate the diversity between Raleigh neighborhoods while creating enriched connections between individuals, neighborhoods, and communities.

Concept: We strive to enhance the identity of Raleigh neighborhoods by creating the opportunity for residents to become placemakers. Similar to the “Paint the Pavement” initiative, we envision creating an annual event in which residents congregate to paint semi-permanent street murals along the Rocky Branch Trail that visually encapsulate the current cultural climate of neighborhoods in Raleigh (please see below for more details on location).

However, to establish a true sense of participation, we want to take it a step further by enabling everyone in the community to co-create the design. We challenge ourselves to determine a method that enables individuals to visually recognize his/her contribution. This could potentially take the form of a supporting app and/or website.

Although each neighborhood creates a customized, unique visual identity we also propose to create a unifying branding system through which we conceptually integrate individuals into neighborhoods and neighborhoods into a larger community.

Location: The Rocky Branch Trail runs through a variety of Raleigh neighborhoods and park systems along the Capital Greenway Trail System. The trail has the potential to catalyze dynamic partnerships by providing a culturally neutral venue.

The street murals also serve as an alternative form of wayfinding that suggests a reconceptualization of the definition of a neighborhood. Traditional signs and maps imply neighborhoods are bound by arbitrary demarcations. However, the murals as “signage” intimate that neighborhoods are defined by the people that comprise them rather than their physical locations.

CONNECTING THE MARTIN STREET CONNECTOR TO The Rocky Branch Trail through Boylan Heights and Raleigh Union Station enables accessibility by creating a loop.

Aims/Challenges:

• Establish a real sense of participation: give citizens tangible way to contribute
• Encourage Involvement:
  • keep interactions simple, straightforward, and accessible. Input needs to be succinct to encourage maximum user participation
  • Allow Access: Maintain physical (closing the gap between the Martin Street connector, Raleigh Union Station through Boylan Heights to create a loop) as well as cognitive accessibility
• Co-Creation
  • Is this essentially a crowdsourcing app that utilizes user input to aid in the design of the mural?
    • The mural is essentially a form of data visualization that allows people to see what is currently important to the neighborhood.