Reconstruction of Histories: A Case Study of El Gourna →

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New Gourna, Egypt is an internationally celebrated and recognized village for Hassan Fathy’s attempts at inclusive participatory planning. This exploration began with wanting to understand why this new village, with all its glory, failed, recognizing the breadth of research. In the creation of New Gourna we can see the reconstruction of local history as analogous with the struggle to represent a complex national identity, which led to questioning not the failure, but rather the rejection by the community of New Gourna. This led to exploring issues of westernization, national identity, and the historically marginalization people.

Concluding from this, the case of El Gourna was rather the greater failure of ‘designing for the poor’ instead of designing for the historically marginalized and under valued. Current campaigns are advocating the conservation and protection of New Gourna, however hesitancy toward celebrating this cultural and historical reconstruction comes from the discrepancies in recognizing a legitimate culture and history of the Gournis themselves. In this reconstruction, priority was given to the protection of the ancient heritage over the reality of the contemporary culture and needs. While recent attempts have been made internationally to be more conscientious towards current use and socio-cultural significance of a site in conserving an ancient history, their effectiveness has yet to be truly evaluated in changing the practice within the global culture of historical reconstruction. So, how can these seemingly disparate cultures, ancient history and the present generation, become equalized in their relevance to preserve and plan for today and tomorrow?

“Old Gourna Village was the impetus for Hassan Fathy’s New Gourna Village. The idea for the new village was launched by the Egyptian Department of Antiquities as a solution to the problem of relocating the entire entrenched community of entrepreneurial excavators that had established itself over the royal necropolis in Luxor. The villages resisted relocating to the new village and made every effort to stay where they were.”

— James Steele

“A decrepit bent-back man with a white beard come forward, hobbling on a stick. The judge pounced on him with a question: ‘You expended reserved wheat?’

‘It was my wheat, your honour, and I ate it with my family.’

‘Pleads guilty. One month with hard labour!’

‘A month! Do you hear, Muslims! My own wheat, my own crop, my own property...!’
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Surely his ears must have deceived him and the spectators must have heard the truth. For he had stolen no man’s wheat. It is true that the usher had visited him and ‘reserved’ his wheat, appointing him as its trustee until such time as he paid the government tax. But the pangs of hunger had seized him violently – him and his family; so he had eaten his own wheat. But who could possibly regard him as a thief on that account and punish him for stealing?”

— Tawfik al-Hakim, excerpt from The Diary of a Country Prosecutor

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Research team: Nadia Elokdah, Nora Elmarzouky, and Kat Horstmann

Rebuilding a Social Public Place

Image Credit: Protests in Tahrir Square February 2011. BBC.com

What is striking about the last few years of large scale community protesting throughout Cairo is not necessarily the recognition and use of Tahrir Square as a public center, but rather that there was a public space capable of serving such a purpose.  Much of the urban planning across Cairo over the last few decades has been diametrically opposed to such en masse grouping or organizing. The strategy for urban designers, as directed by former President Mubarak, was to install barriers, as seen in the photo below, in order to very physically control how public spaces were used by their inhabitants. These barricades restricted movement between public spaces and across streets, creating islands that trap the pedestrian.  By the observation of urbanist Mohamed Elshahed of the Cairobserver, “These walls circumventing Egyptian public spaces reveal the way the state perceives its denizens as mere herds.” For many years, Cairenes were alienated from their own city through these mechanisms; the public space did not belong to the public. They had no right to the space, no common ground.

Spiro Kostof identifies public places as a destination, purpose-built stages for ritual and interaction, such as the Greek Agora where ideas are discussed, opinions exchanged, politics made. The direct mission of the Mubarak Government was to prevent precisely this type of engagement among the citizens of Cairo. These public spaces certainly were not spaces “of the people, for the people, and by the people,” as Jun discusses in his article ‘The People’s City’. The significance of the events in Tahrir Square in January and February of 2011 stems from overcoming this long-established framing of the public space throughout the city. Cairenes recaptured the public spaces of Cairo as the civic spaces of the public, reactivating the intended purposes.

Forcibly occupying the square, while impactful, is note necessarily sustainable. What comes next for the public spaces of Cairo? Is it really feasible for the people to occupy their city, at least the public spaces, peacefully, with government cooperation?  Lubin makes a valuable suggestion for such a future, “…the public and the city government must collectively resolve how public spaces will be used to further participatory democracy.” There must be collaboration in the design and use of the public spaces of the city; top-down approaches will not sustain a successful future for the city or its people. Public spaces can be the common ground to rebuilding trust within communities, between citizens and government, and overcoming division. Cairo is just beginning to understand this.

“Where crowds gather, history is made.” – Kostof

Power Designs the ‘Ideal City’

“Ideal cities exist in context. They are often intended to clarify the standing of a ruler in relation to his subjects and a wider circle of contemporaries,” (Kostof,163). Some consideration of order is often imposed upon a community as a leader establishes power, whether it be the formal layout of a grid in order to control land or the introduction of new functions as superior to prior urban systems. In contemporary cities still besieged with defining a cultural identity, often a result of latent occupation, this process by which sources of power execute urban change or ‘renewal’ come under the guise of creating a forward-looking Ideal City. In his essay Arabian Tabula Rasa, Yasser Elsheshtawy speaks to the actualization of such ideal cities as “…shaped by their rulers – how their whims, opinions, and personalities direct the development of these cities.” Through such self-aggrandizing ideas, influencers of these new Arabian cities “create a city and turn it into [their own] paradise,” (100). These urban spaces disregard the needs and wants of the population, prioritizing images of power and advancement as understood by those outside the city, rather than systems integral to those within it. How does this create a culturally sustainable urban space?

As seen in the image above, Zaha Hadid Architects proposed design for Cairo’s new Expo City reveals this exact struggle Egypt is navigating in order to appear a cosmopolitan city to the global community before the needs of its overcrowded, underserved urban community. In the opinion of the government, “[t]he project is one of great significance for Cairo, a city which is undergoing revitalization. With this exceptional design by Zaha Hadid Architects, Cairo will be among the world’s top cities…” The concerns of those in power have little to do with the community, geography, history, or culture. In fact, it seems accurate to interpret the goals of the new Expo City solely as a beacon for global city status, regardless of all other interests.

As Elsheshtawy astutely summarizes, all cities in the Arab region, and across the globe, are not the same, they each have their own context within which urban development must react. The powers guiding and implementing the current stream of urban development, rather, is “geared toward an approach that is…a-historical,” (101) hyperconscious of change as the mask of such ideal cities. It seems important to question the role of government power, however. Does the vision of the ideal city, that is one reflecting the deals of those outside the city, prove effective when the urban community is marginalized as a result? Can a city even be identified as ideal if the basic needs of the community (modernized infrastructure, adequate housing, access to employment) remain overlooked? Are the authoritative powers misinterpreting their role in creating a sustainable and representative urban renewal in Cairo?

Planned is Greater Than Unplanned

The Imbaba neighborhood in Cairo is one of the largest informal housing Mega-slums in the world. The region is overcrowded, lacks basic access to clean water, and the electricity can be cut-off without a moment’s notice. Imbaba is seen as an inconsequential rural settlement struggling to operate as a city, with unfinished brick buildings encasing the small market streets. Despite its sheer size and density, the Egyptian government has long ignored much of the region, until recently when, as a part of the Cairo 2050 plan, this land seemed too valuable to go to waste as informal settlement.

The government put into place a new urban plan for Imbaba, one that would allow for a new urban park, roadway extensions, and low-income housing for the long ignored residents. However, as shown, these new apartments disregard the existing hierarchy of the informal urban environment developed for access to the market, neighborhood relationships, and visual privacy. None of the planning or intention of the informal settlement is recognized by the government’s formal plan. This lack of acknowledgment exemplifies the struggle between the ruling body and the inhabitants. Why is the informal city viewed as unplanned and therefore inferior? Why is the vision of Cairo’s master plan valued more so than the informal settlement? It seems to be that the power to create a planned vision of the city seen as forward-thinking and recognizes the ideals of Western cities. Is this an image Egyptians should seek to manifest? Is the image of a planned city inherently greater than the function of an informal one?