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  Daniel Hess, left, associate professor of urban and regional planning, and student Matthew Wattles in the studio at Baikal International Winter University of Urban Planning Design in Irkutsk, Russia.

By PATRICIA DONOVAN

Published: March 15, 2012

While spending several weeks in Siberia—in February—might not sound like a dream vacation, it was the opportunity of a lifetime for UB planning student Matthew Wattles.

The senior environmental design major took part in an international competition to solicit proposals to address uncontrolled development in the city of Irkutsk, Russia. His team, which included students from Russia, Lebanon and France, won the 13th session of the International Winter University (WU) competition, held Feb. 11 to March 4 at Baikal International Winter University of Urban Planning Design in Irkutsk, Russia.

Wattles was the only American among students from around the world who participated in the competition.

The WU, which is built around a different theme each year, asked participants to offer Irkutsk’s city planners and politicians fresh ideas to address the Siberian city’s uncontrolled urban development, bring its expansion under control and promote better development programs. The competition is held in partnership with Irkutsk State Technical University; Les Ateliers, France; and the Union of Architects of Russia.

“The main goal of the Baikal international university competition programs,” says Daniel Hess, UB associate professor of urban and regional planning who accompanied Wattles to Russia, “is to encourage participants’ interest in creative work by involving them in regional investment projects like this one, in which students from around the world get practical experience in solving some of Irkutsk’s very real urban planning issues. Another goal is to promote a professional, urban-planning culture among them.”

The subject of the competition this year was “Suburbanization: The City and Ecology.” Architects, urban economists, ecologists and students in several disciplines from 30 countries worked in a planning studio, where they addressed the suburbanization problems faced by Irkutsk’s population of nearly 600,000; the city is on the shore of Lake Baikal, the oldest and deepest lake in the world.

Hess explains that during the Soviet era, Irkutsk’s residents were not allowed to own land and most of them lived in Soviet-style, concrete-block apartment buildings within the city limits. With the end of the Soviet Union, however, people quickly began to leave those apartments and build their own homes on the edge of the city.

The problem, he says, is that they often built their homes anywhere they wanted, in whatever style appealed to them and with little regard for the design of the “neighborhood” or the status of surrounding infrastructures.

“There was no plan, so development was uncontrolled. Homes were built without consideration for what was across the road or down the street, or whether a particular building complemented the one next door, or whether land was used well or poorly,” Hess explains.

“Students certainly were able to see an example of unplanned growth and its consequences at this event,” he adds.

As is typical of planning studios, students assessed the situation and then worked in groups to produce well-researched proposals for change: suggestions as to how the city can grow a little bit smarter and how to involve residents in the planning process.

During the final week, a jury of planning and design professionals, including Hess, helped the students make their presentations more professional and critiqued them for content and quality.

“The students then presented their proposals to the city of Irkutsk,” Hess says. “I am very proud of Matthew Wattles’ proposals and presentations. His work was a credit to UB and to our School of Architecture and Planning.

“As for Irkutsk,” he adds, “I do think the spatial extent of the city should grow and there may be a need to reduce density in the central part of the city and spread people out. But managed growth is healthy growth, and the students explored and presented plans as to how it can best be imposed here before things get out of hand.”

Hess was asked to participate in the competition after presenting a speech last year in St. Petersburg on ethnic segregation in housing in Estonia during the Soviet period and since. He spent his sabbatical in Estonia last year as a Fulbright scholar and has dedicated much of his recent research to this topic.

Wattles says he was eager to participate in the competition and even delayed his graduation a semester to insure his eligibility for the workshop—an independent study project for which Hess was his instructor. As part of his application process, Wattles had to demonstrate his understanding of the subject, so he conducted research outlining the suburbanization of Buffalo.

“Once a center of industrial production for the former Soviet Union,” Wattles notes, “Irkutsk and its environs now suffer from economic decline and population loss. In this sense, Irkutsk shares many similarities with the Rust Belt of the United States.”

In their off hours, participants in the competition had time to explore what is arguably one of Russia’s most beautiful regions—a land of many rivers and rolling hills within the taiga, or boreal forests, of eastern Siberia. Wattles, an avid rock climber, got in some practice on the Siberian rocks.

Both Hess and Wattles agree this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
“A Fulbright Scholar award allowed me to stretch my research in new directions and to new sites,” says Hess. “I am thrilled that I had the opportunity to attend the Winter University in Siberia because it gave me the chance to give a student direct involvement in my scholarship in a fascinating location.”