Month: September 2018

Geoarchaeology and Lost Rivers

Jason Kingarchaeology, city, creeks, geology, history, landscape, london, maps, places, precedents, research, riversLeave a Comment on Geoarchaeology and Lost Rivers

Our understanding on the arc of history around hidden hydrology is informed with maps and accounts from early explorers and settlers to areas, augmented with records, diaries, and oral histories. Often this neglects and misses the valuable stories of indigenous inhabitants of areas, and leaves us with a significantly shorter timelines for reference. The role of archaeology is vital to unlocking the layers of hidden hydrology that don’t emerge from these illustrative written histories, so I was really intrigued with a recent tweet from the Museum of London Archaology (MOLA) (Twitter: @MOLArchaology) that told of their current work, called London’s lost river: the Tyburn.  From their site, the project is the result of “…a team of expert geoarchaeologists  whose work is helping us to understand London’s lost rivers. As an educational charity, we want to share what we’ve learnt, so please join us to explore the story of this long-lost river.”   

Using the interactive ESRI Story Map, MOLA developed a narrative to describe the process and some of the key findings.  Much of the work is conducted along with construction sites, which gives an opportunity to look below the surface while excavation is happening.  The River Tyburn flowed on the north bank of the Thames, and most famously, was routed and defined the space called Thorney that Westminster Abbey was located, seen in this view circa 1530.

The origins of the river are tied to the longer history of the Thames, which is illustrated (see header image) and reaches back to the last glacial period of 11,500 years ago.  From there in, “…this new epoch, known as the Holocene, the Thames began to take the shape we know today, but many channels still criss-crossed the river’s floodplain within the wide gravelly valley. One of  these channels was the Tyburn, which flowed into the Thames.”   In this zone, there are hundreds of sites, or ‘deposit logs’ that are recorded, and these are modelled to create a snapshot, particularly focusing on the depths of land (depicted below as green – high ground and purple – low ground.  From this model, “projected possible courses for the River Tyburn, following the lowest-lying areas of the modelled 11,500-year-old topography.” with a caveat that “the river would have migrated over time.”

Drilling down (literally) into the specificity of the deposits shows the ranges of material and how it can inform, looking at “ancient flora and fauna” and focusing on things like Diatoms, Pollen, and fossils of things like “Ostracods, the remains of small crustaceans, can indicate salinity, water depth, temperature, water acidity/alkalinity”.

Below is “…a cross section, or transect, running north–south from Westminster to Vauxhall Bridge, along the north bank of the Thames. This connects deposit sequences recorded in trenches and boreholes, and helps us look at these sequences over wide areas.”

They also connect their study with the work of Barton and Myers 2016 book ‘The Lost Rivers of London‘ (see here for a post on the same), which speculated on a number of scenarios for the Tyburn, and various routes.  There’s some graphic things I’d change here (namely it’s hard to read the Barton and Myers layers) but the concept is interesting, to overlay varying studies and ‘proof’ the concepts of routing. In essence, does the data reflect the speculation on routes, either reinforcing or disputing what was speculated?  The below map is a composite of this

There’s links to some coverage in London Archaeologist, such as a 2014 article in which “… Tatton-Brown and Donovan used historic documents and maps to suggest that the medieval waterways separating Thorney Island from Westminster were man-made and that the Vauxhall Bridge route was the original and only course of the river.”  The 3D views of the route and the illustration of the provide a speculative view of the area.  From the site:  “Our topographic model supports Barton and Myers’s suggestion that discussing two distinct branches (towards Westminster and towards Vauxhall Bridge) is an over-simplification of what was probably a more complex delta-like network, as shown [below] (artist Faith Vardy).  This geoarchaeological study provides a baseline for reconstructing the evolving landscape; when combined with historical records and archaeology, even more detailed models could be created. The research done by others, such as Tatton-Brown, which focuses on later periods, may be supported by geoarchaeological work undertaken in the future.”

The concept of geoarchaeology is pretty fascinating as well, and worthy of some further exploration.  In the interim, you can check out the MOLA site for what their team does, which focuses on using “…auger or borehole surveys and interpret the archaeological soils and sediments retrieved, allowing us to reconstruct past landscapes and environments.”  The reason for this particular subset is to pick up “…where the archaeology is too deeply buried for traditional excavation techniques to succeed. It is also a cost-effective archaeological evaluation tool and geoarchaeological deposit modelling, which maps buried landscapes and deposits.”  This is relevant as the surface remnants of these, but the underground deposits, so they work in a “…wide range of depositional environments, including alluvial floodplains, fluvial environments and estuarine/intertidal zones. Using palaeo-environmental proxy indicators, such as pollen and diatoms, we reconstruct past environments. Our specialists also use a range of sedimentological techniques.”

These techniques don’t answer every questions, but coupled with expertise and interdisciplinary research, enables us to see further, and deeper than previousl.  The role of archaeology and geoarchaeology in hidden hydrology is vital, as shown above. While we often rely on maps, photos, sketches, and written histories to reconstruct places,

HEADER:  Artist’s reconstruction of a cold climate, braided river, such as the Late Glacial Thames (artist Faith Vardy) – via

A Place for the Senses, Part 2 – Soundscapes

Jason Kingart, creeks, cultural, explorations, history, infrastructure, language, maps, rivers, soundscape, streams1 Comment on A Place for the Senses, Part 2 – Soundscapes

A few months back, I posted part one of this dual post on sensory ways of interpreting spaces and art with a focus on the amazing work around Smellscapes. Part two, as advertised, will shift gears a bit, to think about Soundscapes, and how audio can be used to illuminate places, tell stories, and engage the senses in new ways.  And there’s a lot of exciting stuff happening in this space, and this will barely scratch the surface of what people are doing, but I am focused mostly on that which is relevant to the agenda of hidden hydrology, or in ways that are not directly relevant, could inspire some new methods of intervention and interpretation.

The idea of sound is expressed in a number of interesting ways, and more importance is placed on soundscapes in design, or the larger urban sphere, and the impacts of things like noise and how it impacts humans and other species.  Or conversely, it may just be confronting the dilemma posed by White Noise, in their article about innovative sound artists “The Trouble With Sound Is That It’s Invisible.”  New ways of thinking about these topics more holistically show up under terms like Acoustic Ecology, or Sonic Ecology, which thinks about it from a broader way of thinking.  From the abstract of a introductory paper on Soundscape Ecology , the idea for the authors is that:

“The study of sound in landscapes is based on an understanding of how sound, from various sources—biological, geophysical and anthropogenic—can be used to understand coupled natural-human dynamics across different spatial and temporal scales.”

A great resource on the topic I’ve found is The Acoustic City, which is a book/CD and website focused “on sound and the city…  The book comprises five thematic sections: urban soundscapes with an emphasis on the distinctiveness of the urban acoustic realm; acoustic flânerie and the recording of sonic environments; sound cultures arising from specific associations between music, place, and sound; acoustic ecologies including relationships between architecture, sound, and urban design; and the politics of noise extending to different instances of anxiety or conflict over sound. This innovative essay collection will be of interest to a wide range of disciplines including architecture, cultural studies, geography, musicology, and urban sociology.”  

INTERACTIVE SOUNDSCAPES/WALKS

There’s a number of leaders in the field, but I will lead off with one of the rock-stars of this sub-genre that is doing inspired work around water is Leah Barclay, who seems to be everywhere doing amazing work.  From her bio: “Leah Barclay is an Australian sound artist, composer and researcher working at the intersection of art, science and technology. She specialises in acoustic ecology, environmental field recording and emerging fields of biology exploring environmental patterns and changes through sound. Over the last decade her work has focused on the conservation of rivers, reefs and rainforests through interdisciplinary creative projects that inspire communities to listen.”   One such installation is called Hydrology, which is a collection of sounds “…recorded using hydrophones (underwater microphones) in freshwater and marine ecosystems across the planet.” and River Listening, which is “an interdisciplinary collaboration designed to explore the creative possibilities of aquatic bioacoustics and the potential for new approaches in the conservation of global river systems.”   Her work is also available at this interesting site 100 Ways to Listen, from Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University, which has a ton of great soundscape info, focusing on “exploring the art and science of sound and documenting a decade of innovative music-making.”

The idea of interactive sound around water has a few specific precedents worth focusing on hidden hydrology directly.  A project I mentioned a few years back is relevant, SCAPE’s work in Lexington, Kentucky. which featured that of a series of listening stations and a self-guided ‘Water Walk‘ for their project around Town Branch Commons, to tell the story giving users:  a broad understanding of the biophysical area around the Town Branch, reveals the invisible waters that run beneath the city, and demonstrates some of the impacts each resident of Lexington can have on the river and its water quality. By sharing how water systems and people are interrelated—both locally and globally—the Town Branch Water Walk makes stormwater quality relevant, linking it with the history, culture, and ecology of the city.”

Another project that really embodies the potential of this is a School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) project from professor Linda Keane and artist Eric Leonardson called  RiverWorks, which is described as “…an interactive transient sound mapping and community engagement series of classes that reimagines and visualizes the sustainable world above and beneath the surface of the Chicago River. Challenging engagement with water, water habitats, water conservation and water quality, students activate new connections and thinking about the Chicago River as a healthy, working and recreational ecology. Inspired by John Cages’ 1978 Dip in the Lake series of acoustical experiences throughout Chicago, the course captures sounds of water, water use and misuse in the city.” 

Students explore and create art, around walking, sensing, and as a project called River Listening, which is exciting as an “interdisciplinary collaboration examines creative possibilities for marine bioacoustics and the potential for new approaches to the conservation of urban global river systems…  students fabricate hydrophones for listening for wildlife diversity below the river’s surface. Connecting invisible riverine life with urban water infrastructure, River Listening activates familiar places with unfamiliar information creating immersive spaces. Students experience interactive listening labs and document field recordings in preparation for sound maps, spontaneous performances, and installations that creatively use everyday technologies.”

An article in Open Rivers Journal from 2017 by Christopher Caskey provides a fascinating context for this work.  “Listening to a River: How Sound Emerges in River Histories” which posits that environmental historians could use sound more to develop inquiry into environments.  Drawing from Peter Coates article “The Strange Stillness of the Past: Toward an Environmental History of Sound and Noise”, in which Coates “argues both for “knowing nature through sound” and “picking up nature’s voices” in his case for analyzing sound in environmental history”, the article focuses this idea on rivers, ending with this important conclusion:

“Rivers are particularly auditory places. They make their own sounds and they have played important roles in influencing aural culture. Whether as a storytelling device, as part of an analysis, or even as an inclusion for the sake of posterity, the sounds of a river, both past and present, are worth documenting as part of the historical record.”

SOUND MAPS

An interesting strategy is to provide maps of sounds, which tie the auditory with the spatial, as mentioned in this abstract “growing research initiatives that take up soundmapping as a way of inquiring into pressing spatial, geo-political and cultural issues primarily in cities and also in the endangered wilds.”  This happens in a few ways, but can include modern soundscapes, where there are no shortage of maps and sites documenting the sounds of places, including global maps, such as this one from Cities and Memory, or Locus Sonus and to cities as diverse as Charlottesville, Virginia, Florence, Italy, Shanghai, China, and  Montreal, Canada (below)

Each map comes with its own agenda, which ranges from nature sounds, biodiversity, urbanization, transit, social spaces, art or even places of quiet.  The key, is that these maps have to have some agenda or viewpoint and have some innovative delivery method, otherwise, they will be boring, as pointed out in this great opinion piece on the subject, “Sound Maps in the 21st Century: Where Do We Go From Here?”

The idea of mapping historical sounds does have a viewpoint, as it allows ways of connecting to the past, and appreciating the changing nature of urban environments.  One of my favorites is The Roaring Twenties, which gives an extensive spatial overview of NY City by coupling noise complaints and newsreels with places and sounds – giving a hint of a place, more focused on the man-made than natural sounds, but the section ‘Harbor & River’ connects a bit with the hydrology, along with some info on Sewer/Water Construction.

Another extensive example is the London Sound Survey, which is a really ambitious project (more here).  There’s interesting maps of a range of topics both contemporary and historical, including the hydrological, focusing on both exportation of the Thames Estuary, and a  map of London’s waterways “An auditory tribute to Harry Beck’s Underground map, the skeleton which has long lent shape to the city in the minds of Londoners. Here sounds were collected from along London’s canals and lesser rivers.”   

MUSIC

A number of interesting projects focus on music, which can be used to creatively engage with the environment.  Re:Sound is an experimental music series which explores the relationship between forgotten spaces, sound abstraction and the natural environment.

The ClimateMusic Project is another sort of endeavor with a larger mission to “…enable the creation and staging of science-guided music and visual experiences to inspire people to engage actively on the issue of climate change.  As an analogy for climate, music is familiar, accessible, and—for most people—much easier to relate to than articles or lectures. We created The ClimateMusic Project to harness this universal language to tell the urgent story of climate change to broad and diverse audiences in a way that resonates, educates, and motivates.”

The use of apps is an interesting option as well, melding GPS and music to orchestrate unique experiences that change and evolve as one moves through space.  One I’ve always been excited about is by Bluebrain from 2011 and their installation“‘Central Park (Listen to the Light)’ … a site-specific work of music that responds to the listeners location within the stretch of green of the same name in New York City…  work by tracking a users location via the iPhones built-in GPS capabilities. Hundreds of zones within the landscape are tagged and alter the sound based on where the listener is located in proximity to them. Zones overlap and interact in dynamic ways that, while far from random, will yield a unique experience with each listen. The proprietary design that is the engine behind the app stays hidden from view as the melodies, rhythms, instrumentation and pace of the music vary based on the listeners’ chosen path…. The app is the work itself. A musical ‘Chose-Your-Own-Adventure’ that does not progress in a linear fashion but rather allows the listener to explore the terrain and experience music in way that has never been possible before now. “Read more about this in a NY Times article ‘Central Park, The Soundtrack‘ from when it was released as well, and check out a short video here.

Phantom Islands is an interesting work that exists in the peripheral vision of Hidden Hydrology.  Developed by experimental musician Andrew Pekler, which was part of an oddly intriguing show called Fourth Worlds, Imaginary Ethnography in Musical and Sound Experimentation.   From the site: “Phantom Islands are artifacts of the age of maritime discovery and colonial expansion. During centuries of ocean exploration these islands were sighted, charted, described and even explored – but their existence has never been ultimately verified. Poised somewhere between cartographical fact and maritime fiction, they haunted seafarers’ maps for hundreds of years, inspiring legends, fantasies, and counterfactual histories. Phantom Islands – A Sonic Atlas interprets and presents these imaginations in the form of an interactive map which charts the sounds of a number of historical phantom islands.”   

A screenshot of it is below of one of the ‘entries’, but you really have to go experience it, let loose and have fun.

And, closing the loop on the musical side, there’s a fun Billboard article ‘10 Songs About Rivers‘ which, I feel, focused a bit much on the contemporary and missed some classics, but fun to think about. The BBC has plenty of interesting music, such as the session on Playing the Skyline, in which “musicians look at how the land meets the air and imagine it as music.”  And if we’re getting fully into the influence of environmental on music, a series of works by composer Tobias Picker inspired by Old and Lost Rivers, and even a Lost Rivers Opera from the Czech Republic, which i had a link to in the past but is now no longer working (anyone help there?)

So much more to explore, but this at least provides a primer on sound, and I’m excited to see more about how people are using this media to explore and expand our awareness, specifically focused on hydrology.  Any ideas in that realm, please feel free to comment.

HEADER:  Franz Max Osswald, contact print of sound photographs in architectural models, from Osswald’s applied acoustics laboratory at ETH Zurich, 1930–33 – taken from “A Visual Imprint of Moving Air – Methods, Modles, and Media in Architectural Sound Photography, ca. 1930 – Sabine von Fischer

Denver Drainage Unearthed

Jason Kingcity, creeks, daylighting, denver, design, infrastructure, parks, places, rivers, streamsLeave a Comment on Denver Drainage Unearthed

A recent article in the Denver Post “Denver accelerates “daylighting” of lost waterways, “undoing history” with decades-long re-engineering effort” discusses some exciting new work on restoring hidden hydrology and “Re-opening of buried waterways” in the area to manage stormwater runoff and create habitat.  The context:

“Old Denver pulsed with H2O, water that snaked through the creeks and irrigation canals crisscrossing Colorado’s high prairie before 150 years of urban development buried most of them or forced them into pipes.”

A similar story to many cities across the globe, “…developers focused on filling in creeks to make way for the construction of railroads, streets, smelters and housing — all laid out across a grid imposed on the natural landscape.”  This can be remedied today “…by reconstructing the urban landscape where possible, they’ll slow down water, filter it through vegetation to remove contaminants, control storm runoff and nourish greenery to help residents endure the climate shift toward droughts and rising temperatures.”

DENVER, CO – AUGUST 27: Newly planted grasses grow along Montclair Creek on August 27, 2018 in Denver, Colorado. The City of Denver is working on restoring the creek to help with future flooding. (Photo by RJ Sangosti/The Denver Post)

It’s heartening to see this large of a paradigm shift, and engineers, such as Bruce Uhernik, whom quoted saying:

“We’re just trying to take back that space and make waterways more natural and more beautiful. Why would people not want something to be more natural? This is being responsible — not just to what the city and people need, but to the environment’s needs. Birds. Fish. Trees that should be growing along these corridors. All these work in unison. If you break the chain, things fall off course.”

I appreciate some of the language, but the term “undoing history” is a bit strange to me as I always think of projects like this, in any form, as redoing history.  I guess it’s your take on what is history: the original pre-development condition that needs to be restored, or the interventions and filling as the history that needs undoing.  As mentioned, there’s plenty of history as “Historic Denver maps from the late 1800s show multiple irrigation canals and curving dotted lines denoting unnamed waterways, including a creek that flows through the Montclair Basin from Fairmount Cemetery toward north Denver industrial areas where smelting and rendering plants were located along the South Platte.”  

Either way, it’s a cool project, and has some unique components and context, much of which can be found in the Denver Public Works ‘Green Infrastructure Implementation Strategy‘, a document broad interventions for stormwater and habitat.  The prevalence of creeks is seen in the map of Recieving Waters (page 7) shows that while there are a number of urban creeks, they are impacted by residential, commercial, and industrial development throughout the region,

 

A series of maps in the report outlines pollutants of concern like Fecal bacteria and E.coli, Total Suspended Solids (TSS), Nitrogen, Phosphorous.  This map (page 21) shows subbasin level designations of Nitrogen, which is elevated by human activity, and can lead to algae blooms, and issues with aquatic species.

A focus on the urban core includes the Platte to Park Hill (Part of area 20 above (City Park/Park Hill), which integrates a number of systems.  As mentioned in the report:  “Stormwater Systems is taking a
comprehensive green infrastructure approach to better protecting people and property against fooding while improving water quality and enhancing public spaces.  Four projects are part of the Platte to Park Hill… Collectively, the  four coordinated projects will increase neighborhood connectively, add new park and recreation spaces, provide critical food protection, and improve water quality.” (page 54)  The Globeville Landing Outfall project is one of these segments, as part of the strategy, using open channel design, which “…will help clean storm water naturally when possible and will move the water to its ultimate destination, the South Platte River.”  A rendering of the plan:

The 39th Avenue Greenway (also seen in the header) also includes open channels for flood control and storm events.  The opportunity to layer community function with these facilities is key, as they are “…designed using a community-focused approach to provide the following benefits in addition to flood protection… “ which includes new open space, bike/walking trails, and more.  A rendering shows this integration.

An additional article from the Denver Channel provides a bit more perspective in video form on the Montclair Creek Project, including the “gray to green” approach “correcting past mistakes” focusing on the daylighted river weaving through a golf course and some more urban parts of the City, along with a greenway as mentioned above prior to outlet into the South Platte River.  The funds for the project, which were not insubtantial at $300 million, were voter-approved, with “daylighting of old waterways that were forced into pipes and buried during the industrial revolution in favor or streets, railroads and homes.”  

HEADER: Image of the 39th Avenue Greenway and Open Channel  – via the ‘Green Infrastructure Implementation Strategy‘ (page 55)

A First Map of Portland?

Jason Kingcity, creeks, general, history, maps, oregon, places, portland, rivers3 Comments on A First Map of Portland?

There’s a plethora of early maps of Portland, many of which I’ve recently included and cataloged here for reference.  One of those maps I’d never seen before recently, oddly, is this sketch-map made by William Clark (yes, he of Lewis & Clark expedition fame) from April 3, 1806, featuring a sketch of the Multnomah River, “given by several different Tribes of Indians near its entrance into the Columbia.”  The original link comes from this Oregon Encyclopedia article on the Wapato (Wappato) Valley Indians, found whilst researching native settlements in Portland, notably those around the important confluence of the Willamette and Columbia but getting a feel for pre-settlement use of waterways. The map is found in Volume Four of the Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 1804-1806, which constitutes the return trip of the Corps of Discovery from Fort Clatsop on the Oregon Coast back towards the east.  The entry and fold-out map includes a remarkable amount of information including natural and hydrological features, as well as references to many of the tribes as alluded to in the title.

It’s amazing to see the detail of the map and density of information, in what I assume was field drawn, probably in a canoe, fending off bears while simultaneously collecting plant samples.  I jest, but I’m constantly amazed at the ability of early explorers to represent places quickly and with much    For me, at least, it was much easier to conceptualize graphically if you rotate the map so north is facing up, so the subsequent enlargements flip this over.  This enlarged view shows the key features at the confluence, perhaps not drawn to scale, but remarkably accurate, including to the east, both the Washougal River (noted as Teal) and the Sandy River (noted as the Quick Sand). There are also notes on the various encampments on river banks, such as the Nechacolee and Nechacokee around Blue Lake in Portland on the south bank, Shoto up around modern day Vancouver Lake to the north and many more smaller encampments of the local Multnomah and Kathlamet tribes. To the west, around Wappato Island (modern day Sauvie Island) which was home to Multnomah, Clannahqueh, Cathlahcommahtup and others on Sauvie Island on the Columbia River, and around the other side of the island, known as the Multnomah Channel. See this additional post from the Oregon Encyclopedia for Lewis & Clark’s estimate of the Portland Basin Chinookian Village tribal populations here as well for more detail.

The same zone taken from a Google Earth image shows the general location of and features. The fidelity of the geography is a bit off (it’s a sketch map) but it’s all there.

Further south, the geography is a bit more sparse, but does include the upriver span of the Willamette (called here the ‘Multnomah River’) and it’s connection to the Clackamas River (heading east) including encampments of Clackamas along that river, and perhaps mis-estimating a bit how far away Mt. Jefferson actually was (see below)… and ‘The Falls’ which denotes Willamette Falls, which was an important settlements along this important confluence,  and Charcowah, and Cushhooks near the Falls….

The same view of current day area, again with a bit of misalignment of the rivers, which probably comes from the map being adapted from a drawing done by a local tribal elder, but the general features there.

The text supplements the map somewhat, with stories of meeting a group of Shah-ha-la Nation and showing them the Multnomah:

“we readily prevailed on them to give us a sketch of this river which they drew on a Mat with a coal, it appeared that this river which they call Mult-nó-mah discharged itself behind the Island we call the image canoe island, as we had left this island to the south in decending & assending the river we had never seen it.  they informed us that it was a large river and runs a considerable distance to the south between the Mountains.”

Clark takes a party to explore, and encounters huts from various tribes, along with harvesting of wappato and roots via canoes along the rivers, and found the hidden entrance to the Willamette (which he refers to as the Multnomah River, along with the tribes on Wappato Island and noted the depth of the.  He mentions that he “…can plainly see Mt. Jefferson” which may allude to it’s proximity on the one map.  As he continued to explore he mentions being “satisfyed of the size and magnitude of this great river which must water that vast tract of Country between the western range of mountains and those on the sea coast and as far S. as the Waters of Callifonia…” which if not totally true, does allude to the size of the Willamette drainage in at least draining a fair portion of NW Oregon.  He continues by visiting a long house, and learns the constant refrain of deaths from small pox and starvation. He asks for a map of the area and the people from one of the elders.  “I provailed on an old man to draw me a sketch of the Multnomar River and give me the names of the nations resideing on it which he readiliy done, and gave me the names of 4 nations who reside on this river two of them very noumerous. The first is Clark-a-mus nation reside on a small river… the 2.d is the Cush-hooks who reside on the NE side below the falls.”

They note the entrance to the Multnomah river being “142 miles up the Columbia river” from the Pacific, include the sketched map, and then are off, up-river, continuing eastward.

An excerpt of the journal, the specific passage of which is available via this Oregon Encyclopedia post here as well.