The Yamanote - Moving Objects in Space
Location: Tokyo
Year: Third
Tokyo studio and seminar: XL Travelogues, XS Manifestos: Meditations on the Contemporary City
Instructors: Dr. Erez Golani Solomon, Prof. Keigo Kobayashi and Eliran Mishal
In collaboration with Sagi Malul
The Yamanote, a railway line started in Tokyo as a loop in 1925, became one of Tokyo's busiest and most important lines, connecting most of Tokyo's major stations and urban centers.
In this project we created an imaginary Tokyo, where the Yamanote line is a perfect geometric circle. In this city, where the outlines of the buildings, the route of the streets and even the topography are significantly different from the existing Tokyo, the relations between the outside and the inside are redefined and become simpler to perceive by precise measurement methods.
The imagined train line is completed in 61 minutes, just as its real world counterpart, allows us to explore, through the laws of physics, the perception of space and the unique experience created by objects and spaces moving in space, which opens a new chapter in urban architecture.
Here, through different imaginary scenarios (each of which is represented by XS) the relationship between the passenger and the pedestrian is re-examined. As a result, we discover how the city is experienced while in motion, via a consideration of the physical attributes that influence this experience.
Precise mathematical calculation and theoretical experimentation have led us to edit documents presenting a new circular world called the Yamanote line.
XL-01
XS-01
Introduction – Shows the both the real Yamanote line and the new imaginary one. In addition, it shows that there is, now, a new center of the line – a residential hotel.
XS-02
The distorted center – The process of making the Yamanote line a circle is a very aggressive act toward the city. We stretched an enormous space to fit our needs and as a consequence we flattened the topography and made vacant places all over the center of the line. In order to emphasize the huge changes which this piece of land went through we took the new center of the Yamanote and distorted it in the same manner we would do to make the circular Yamanote back to its real state.
XS-03
The Fisherman – There is a train that goes around in a circular line at a certain speed and a person sitting in the center of the line on an observation point in the shape of a ring. The speed of the ring depends on the train's speed in a way that they both complete the whole round simultaneously. The person on the high ring will see the train's view for much longer and in a bigger portion than the person on the train because of the extreme difference of speed and distance.
XS-04
The same and the different - Two trains are at a maximum distance between each other at a certain point in time. There is a person on an observation point exactly between the two trains and another person who is standing outside the train lines at another observation point. Both observation points are at the same distance from the outer train. The people on these points will get the same experience from one train but will get a different experience from the other train.
XS-05
Blind spot - There are two trains that go in opposite directions (on two different circles) and pass each other every 61 minutes – once in one loop. The speed of the trains is determined in a way that the passing point will always be the same. When they pass each other, every train covers a part of the city for the other train. In that way, there is always one point in the city that a person who rides a certain train can’t see. To complete the experience, one must ride the other train.
XS-06
The bridge – There are two trains that go in the same direction in different circles. Their speed is determined in a way that they are always parallel to each other. There is a bridge that connects both trains. Because of the fact that the speed depends on the distance from the center of the circles, every part on the bridge moves at a different speed which affects the duration of the time given to watch the view on every part. This is how a person can get a different experience from every part of the bridge by the changing speed.
XS-07
The sniper - In order to see a certain point, the location of the train should allow a view towards it and the person should look in the right direction. Here, we decided on a certain point on one building along the way and calculated where the train and the person looking should be for him to see it.
XS-07-Back
The sniper (back) - we called this situation the sniper because of the similarity of catching a certain view on speed and hitting a target.
XS-08
Shows the car of the Yamanote train from inside.
XS-09
Centrifugal force - When we made the train line a pure geometric circle we made the passengers go through the centrifugal force all along the ride. This force tries to push the people off the circular line they are moving in, only the train walls preventing them from flying off the train.
XS-09-Back
in this document we put people on the train roof, where there are no walls protecting them, the centrifugal force is pushing them off the train.
XS-10
Fictitious force – the Yamanote line will have 30 stops in the near future. The train stands in every station for 27.5 seconds (on average). Because of the fact that the train has to complete a 34.5 kilometer loop in 61 minutes, it has to accelerate to full speed (90km/h) in the shortest time possible but because of the short distance between two stops, it has to decelerate soon after again in the shortest time possible. The processes of accelerating and decelerating the train are putting force on the passengers – pushing them back when accelerating and forth when decelerating. In this document, we show the distance the train accelerates in, the distance it’s in full speed, and the distance it decelerates.
XS-10-Back
In this document, we show the effect an acceleration might have on passengers based on their weight when they are not given handles to balance themselves.
XS-11
Walking vs riding – this document shows us the difference between walking and riding the train for 98.7 km. In order to show some of this difference we captured people going through this distance once every second, 10.5 seconds for riding, and 144 seconds for walking in an average speed.
XS-11-Back
in order to examine these experiences, we planned a walking path on one percent of the circle. This path and its surroundings are meant to emphasize the difference between the experience of walking and the experience riding - by putting there elements in which their perception is different while riding or walking. The limit of the path is determined by the longest distance at which a person can recognize another's facial expression. The arcs are made of 12cm width columns - a measurement which is impossible to grasp while riding the moving train. The two stories are meant to emphasize the difference in experience by giving every participant, both the walker and the rider, "equal" opportunities.
