M.E.T. // Modular Engagement Transporter
The Modular Engagement Transporter (M.E.T.) is modeled on the NASA Modular Equipment Transporter used on the Apollo Moon missions to document the surface of the Moon. The M.E.T., referred to as the “rickshaw” by the astronauts, was a cart outfitted with pneumatic tires that carried geological tools, cameras, and sample cases on the lunar surface.
Floating Lab Collective recreated the M.E.T. to contain a variety of tools to engage social exploration processes such as experimental psycho-geographical mapping; informal human topographies; and interactions between inhabitants and their landscape.
Mapping Why
Mapping Why was an M.E.T. action during October of 2012 intended to map realities of the city that cannot be described using traditional measurement parameters. In contrast to governmental census mechanisms, we utilized the Braille image of the word WHY as a mapped route along which to engage participants during a walk extending from Mt. Pleasant to Good Hope Road in Anacostia. WHY invites participants to think critically in response to their circumstances and surroundings. The resulting map visualizes a psycho-social topography in an aggregated and interpretable, but non-definitive, manner. Simultaneous to the collection of WHY questions, specific aspects of the streetscapes were photographed in order to investigate the physical traces and markers of this psycho-social topography. These demarcations helped form a new vocabulary for thinking about the city’s current state and future direction.
U.S.E.
During the process of the WHY project, we investigated the nature of urban habitation by mapping the city’s informal infrastructure. Among the more intriguing elements we documented were newspaper boxes spread throughout the city, with media contents catering to different community demographics. These boxes remain peripheral fixtures until someone’s desire transforms them into necessary destinations.
The USE project attempts to expand the utility of newspaper boxes as a means to critically reshape the city’s social fabric. The USE prototype adapts the marginal newspaper box into a community space, responsive to the needs of the moment. This improvised structure functions as a habitable common space — giving brief respite to anyone needing shelter, rest, storage or work space. This form of urban structure suggests a new logic for the design and construction of cityscape that is creative, unfinished, adaptive, playful — an all-inclusive intersection for the city’s wandering inhabitants. Such re-appropriation of daily urban infrastructure questions the current use of public space and multiplies the possibility of a city occupied by affection.
