I chose to visit a tiny, gentrifying area of Carson, with Greendoor Coffeeshop as the anchor location in the midst of it all. Nearby is the Carson City Hall, with the Carson Community Center not too far away. Just half a mile away is the exit/entrance for Highway 405, which is the major center north/south in Southern California. In the immediate area, there is an IHOP, a restaurant called DogHaus, a residential area called the Renaissance at City Center, an upscale apartment complex.
While exploring, the following five forces came to mind:
- Traffic
With the major 405 highway just half a mile away, and the anchor location at the corner of a four-way intersection at East Carson Street and South Avalon Boulevard, traffic is a major force here that adds to the energy and vibrance of the area. - Lush
In the immediate area, there is a large water fountain, palm trees, vegetation, a Greendoor coffeeshop, vines, and shrubs. There is a lushness to the little area. - Growth
The area is currently being gentrified – about ¼ a mile away is a strip mall with pawn shops, a few takeout, and lavanderia (laundry shop), and next to it seems like new apartment complexes across a mix of chain restaurants and a Ralph’s. - Residence
The area is considered “city center”, and there are apartments being built around the city hall and community center. - Newness
The city of Carson is the youngest municipality in the South Bay area of Los Angeles. The apartments, the little gentrified area with the Greendoor anchor, the city hall, and the community center are all relatively new. The businesses below the apartment complex have only existed for about a year or less.
Part 6
Force 1 Map: Traffic
Force 2 Map: Lush
Force 3 Map: Growth
Force 4 Map: Residence
Force 5 Map: Newness
Nov. 13th Edit:
larger 24” file here.
Nov. 20th edit:
Larger map here.
Ok so explanation here – I was very unhappy with my Nov. 13th map – it felt uninspired, as Serena said I didn’t really have an audience, it barely shows forces. I also had to consolidate a few of my forces, which I felt like left me with nothing. So I decided to do a 3d version of a “map” with a bit of an artistic interpretation (I’m hoping that this is ok).
My attempt to illustrate my 5 forces:
1) residences are the little grey buildings with windows on them, surrounded by man-made trees.
2) the element of lushness are the foliage and trees.
3) traffic manifests itself with a ‘traffic-over-time’ illustration, showing what the car buildup looks like from the afternoon to end of the working day.
4) the 50% opacity buildings on the top left corner are growth & development, and the lowered opacity is meant to show that it’s not there yet, but that’s what it would look like on the map.
5) the last force is a little hard to see, but it depicts chillness. It’s the gradient circle at 50% opacity, fading into transparency. It’s over the Greendoor coffee shop, as well as the leisurely pool inside the residence. The reason why I chose to represent it this way is because chillness is an ambient force that’s pervasive over an area, and the soft gradient and fade is what comes to mind when I think about a relaxed ambience.
*I haven’t used Illustrator in a billion years and certainly have never done isometry before, so bear with me that it’s rough, but I learned a lot. I definitely had a hard time layering and re-sizing in 3D, it was honestly a nightmare. You can tell my learning curve through my trees – I started off with blocky trees, then got circle trees, then learned how to do oval-ish trees. I liked the diversity in foliage, so I left it there even though it’s not particularly accurate since the lushness I was referring to weren’t topiaries.
Hi Cindy!
Your project partner Ken chiming in here. Alright, I’m going just by what I see in your latest map. Here are some observations:
* I wonder where this is – there’s no title to tell me the location, but it looks like a residential area? Or residential next to a more commercial area.
* I see all the buildings are blue – curious if all the buildings are the same – based on the shape and slant of the buildings on the right, these seem to be all for a particular purpose – that’s interesting. I wonder if there are sub-categories of buildings here.
* The red lines are traffic, but it looks like there are other streets. Are cars only on these streets? The red makes me think it’s just a solid stop-and-go traffic situation. Is that true? Or only certain times of the day?
* Hmm, what is growth? I’d love some more context – maybe a description in a legend?
* The color scheme is pleasing.
* I did think the blue was a water feature in the park until I saw the other buildings.
* Interesting! The top right corner shows a building surrounded by lushness. Below it a building surrounds lushness. Leads me to think the top right corner of the map is a park, and the bottom lushness is a man-made park or garden inside of a shopping center.
Hi Ken!
THanks so much for your feedback! As I had mentioned, I decided I would completely revamp the map, and here’s how I addressed it:
* titled, residential buildings have a little door, office buildings have many more windows
* only difference are residential & office, and then 50% opacity for not having been built yet.
* I added times and 50% opacity cars, is it clearer?
* I think opacity shows growth here… or at least I hope so haha
* Thanks! Now you know my secret 😉
* hopefully the key worked
* you are absolutely right, the lushness is made from man-made park inside a little center
Hi Cindy!
I appreciate the depth of your initial question and scope. Using a gentrifying area brings an opportunity to go beyond the surface level and look at what changes mean and what other impacts follow.
I got some great feedback from Jesse on how to approach my maps and since there is a similar quality to mine, I’ll share.
Look for diversification in your force. Within Newness, are there levels of newness you could show? Remembering the moment a map is created, it is dated.
Also, think about how the overlays will come together when the final map is created, which layer will come through, how are the intersections represented.
Hey John,
Thanks so much for giving feedback on newness. I took it as opacity, as in implying “these buildings are supposed to be there, but they aren’t yet.”
Unfortunately the only thing I could think about was doing things in 3d – so that’s what I did.
Hi Cindy!
Everyone else has given great feedback about ways to depict growth and newness as a spectrum (lush could also be shown this way) so I’ll focus on the design stuff instead.
I like that you’ve chosen bold colors for each of your forces, but it might help to wash out and simplify the background a bit for contrast. How many of the details in the satellite view are really needed to understand your forces? Ideally, I’d like to see more details in your forces and fewer details in your background.
I’m also wondering who your intended audience is for this map. Who is going to use it? Which aspects will give them an emotional connection to the content? Thinking about those questions might help you conceptualize how bring all of your forces together and take them to the next level.
Hi again!
I love what you’ve done with your final map– there’s plenty of contrast and each of your forces is easily identified. You might consider changing the building colors, since the blue buildings on green in the park look like man-made lakes at first glance.
I have some force questions for you to think about as you revise for the final deadline…
1. Traffic: Is the amount of traffic steady on those roads throughout the day? Throughout different parts of the road? What about the other roads? (Traffic looks a bit like it’s all-or-nothing at the moment, but I’m sure there are cars on your other roads as well.)
2. Lush: Are there different kinds of greenery? How does its density vary? What about height?
3. Buildings: What’s the significance of these? Why do I need to know they’re here, and what will I do with that information?
4. Growth: Is this static or dynamic? Which buildings/streets/blocks are experiencing growth, and what does that look/sound/feel like to passers-by?
5. If I’m walking into this neighborhood, how & why will I use this map?
Hi Serena! Thank you so much for coming back even though I’m super late to the game.
I decided to completely overhaul my “map”:
1. Traffic: I tried to depict traffic through time with opacity
2. I tried to vary the types of foliage with square, circle, and oblong foliage, as well as different small points of color for flowers.
3. Buildings: So I ended up chunking out
4. Growth: this is an interesting one, and for me I chose to make the buildings that will be constructed into 50% opacity, implying that they will be occupying that space soon. So to answer your question, probably static for now. I know they are office buildings because the signs said “work park” or something like that outside the construction area.
5. I think this neighborhood is fairly boring, but the points of interest are definitely getting on/off the highway on the main road (with two cars on it), going to the coffeeshop, and living in the residential area.
I love your new map! It’s so fun and colorful, you’ve depicted variation within your forces, and the creative angle really sets it apart. Great job!
Hi Cindy,
Nice maps! I find your forces to be really interesting because they revolve a lot around gentrification (just as everyone else has basically stated). However, I’m a bit confused as to what is being depicted by “Newness” and “Growth”. Is “Newness” referring to areas that have already been gentrified vs. areas that are still in progress (AKA Growth)?
I think Newness could actually be shown as a color scale. For instance, it could show a gradient from less saturated purple to a more saturated purple where less saturated purple = less new and more satured purple = more new. You could then use Photoshop and sort of “heatmap” the area using a soft brush, painting newer areas more saturated and older areas less so. That was simply a suggestion, but I think giving yourself a spectrum of colors that indicate a scale of newness may help you be more specific with your representation, which might be cool.
Hope I was able to help in some way!
Best,
Grace
Hi Grace!
Sorry for the late reply. In actuality I really hated my map and felt totally uninspired, so I completely overhauled my map over the weekend and reduced the final area of focus. My final map is isometric, so I used opacity to show different time stamps (past, current, future). There is a circular gradient that fades into transparency, and that’s to denote the “chill” force, which is the best way I could think about ambience.
Thank you for all the suggestions!
Hey Cindy,
I find it really interesting that there is a “lush” area in the midst of the “growth” area – is this a landscape area that’s being developed?
I also like that “growth” is separated from “newness” only by the time variable. As Christine pointed out, it might be interesting to combine “residence,” “newness” and “growth” on the same map to show how time/gentrification has altered your site area.
I’m also curious what’s going on with the area on the bottom left quadrant of your map, since most of your forces are not located there. It may be worth mapping a new force to give a sense of what’s going on in that area.
Hi Kathlyn,
Everyone got caught up in growth/newness/gentrification and during office hours that week we decided to just combine them, and I picked “chillness” as my fifth force instead.
The bottom quadrant is actually a mobile park home, and in my final map I ended up excluding it because I ended up completely revamping my map over the weekend. I decided it wasn’t worth my time to meticulously draw 100+ small buildings onto a isometric map so I focused down the area to an even smaller radius, and let the residency of the newer apartments be the force.
Hey Cindy!
I love the idea of exploring the gentrification of your chosen area. I’d be curious to see how the “newness” and “growth” could be contrasted with the older areas that are still in existence. It would be really interesting to see the paths that this remodeling and gentrification take throughout the area. Could we see the path of old to construction to new along different routes? By mapping those out, you might be able to see a pattern based on access, geographic features or other forces.
Hi Christine!
Thank you so much for your input. After going to office hours that week, everyone kind of thought that growth/newness/gentrification could be condensed into one. I actually really agonized over what to do, and the force that eluded me was an atmosphere of chillness, so that’s what I ended up doing. Thanks for catching that!
Hi Cindy!
I’m interested in your comments around gentrification as I focused on the forces of gentrification for my map. Do you have a good sense for why there is “growth” and “newness” and what exactly could be driving gentrification?
I think it’s very valid to show the effects of gentrification, but I think it would be interesting to double click on the forces that are causing it.
Thanks!
Alex
Hi Alex,
Yup, gentrification was kind of difficult to display. Honestly the only way I could think about it was doing 2 maps, one overlaid on top of the other with 30-50% opacity (or simply two different maps viewed through x axis) and labeled with the date/year. The bottom map will be the current look, and the one on top is what it used to look like, so the viewers can see what happened to the city through time.