俞孔坚：地理设计展望

　　2013年10月28～29日，北京大学成功举办了地理设计国际会议。在Esri公司（特别是Esri中国）的慷慨赞助下，大会聚集了世界顶级的跨学科的地理设计研究和实践团队，包括地理设计先驱者卡尔•斯坦尼兹和史提芬•欧文，在地理信息与空间分析方面卓有贡献的科学家迈克尔•F•古特柴尔德、伊恩•毕夏普和矢野桂司，著名的景观与空间规划教育家、研究者弗雷德里克•斯坦纳和克里斯托弗•吉鲁特，地理设计先行实践者石川幹子、亨克•J•舒尔滕、道格拉斯•奥尔森和艾略特•哈特利，技术革新者威廉姆•R•米勒（Esri公司地理设计服务商主管）和克里斯托弗•卡佩里（Esri全球业务总监），以及政府决策者章新胜（世界自然保护联盟理事会主席）和董祚继（国土资源部规划司司长）。会上，38位嘉宾发表了精彩的演讲，来自10多个国家和中国30多个省市的500余名代表参加了大会。与此同时，近10万名场外观众观看了大会在线直播，并通过新浪微博（一种类似推特的中国微型博客服务）参与了会议的交流与互动环节。据我所知，这是在中国乃至亚洲举办的规模最大的地理设计国际会议。

　　关于这次大会的起源可追溯到两年多前，当卡尔•斯坦尼兹教授和我在哈佛大学地理信息中心共进午餐，讨论什么是真正的"地理设计"以及为什么地理设计如此重要时。斯坦尼兹教授将地理设计简单地定义为一种"通过设计改变地理环境"的方法。但是，景观设计师、城市规划师、土地利用规划师和区域规划师，甚至包括农民，正在通过设计来改变地理空间形态—这就是为什么我们要讨论地理设计的原因所在。“我们需要组织一个会议来对地理设计进行研讨。”“为何不在中国——这个地理空间形态变化如此迅速且亟需设计的引导的地方——举办这场会议？”“我们可以邀请来自世界各地的顶级专家共探地理设计”。由此，卡尔向Esri创始人兼总裁杰克•丹杰蒙德写信咨询其为本次会议提供赞助的可能性。随后，哈佛大学斯蒂芬•欧文教授也加入到了会议的先期筹备团队中。我们很快就确定了会议的主题——“地理设计：人地关系优化设计的理论与实践”。2012年9月，杰克•丹杰蒙德来到北京参观了北京大学和土人设计近年来完成的课题和项目，他发出惊叹：“你们所做的正是地理设计！”杰克对在北京大学召开地理设计国际会议非常支持，他表示，“在北京大学召开首届亚洲地理设计会议是一个非常好的提议，Esri将对其进行全力资助。”这就是此次地理设计会议的由来。

　　什么是地理设计？为什么要讨论地理设计以及地理设计是做什么的？基于这个优秀团队为期两天的集中讨论（团队成员均为地理设计研究和实践领域的开拓者和领导者），加上我个人的理解，我谨代表大会主办方做以下总结：

　　地理设计是一种思考方式（是什么），旨在解决复杂的空间问题（做什么）。这类问题的复杂性超出了人脑的认知和理解能力，因此，借助系统的地理信息系统和空间分析工具进行计算和提出相应的解决方案变得尤为必要（为什么）。

　　今天我们所面临的挑战非常巨大且日益复杂：气候变化、粮食安全、城市化、地下水位下降、空气和水污染，以及生物多样性的减少等—以上列举的仅是很小的一部分。为了解决这些问题，我们需要大数据和系统的解决方案，这些均超越了任何个人头脑的能力范围。设计，作为一个解决问题的专业，需要充分利用现有的丰富数据来应对现代挑战。地理设计则为我们提供了一种提升能力的方法，即利用大量的信息技术、强大的计算工具和大数据，联合多方利益相关者和愈来愈多的参与者，采用合适的方案去解决我们目前所面临的挑战。地理设计将有望提升整个设计行业，以满足时代的需求。

　　In 28th and 29th of October, 2013, Peking University hosted the Geodesign International Conference. With generous sponsorship from Esri (Esri China in particular), this conference assembled the very best team in research and application of geodesign, across the disciplines, including geodesign forerunners, Carl Steinitz and Stephen M. Ervin; dedicated scientists in geographical information and spatial analysis, Michael F. Goodchild, Ian Bishop and Keiji Yano;prominent educator and researchers in landscape and spatial planning, Frederick Steiner and Christophe Girot; leading practitioners of geodesign, Mikiko Ishikawa, Henk J. Scholten, Douglas Olson and Elliot Hartle; technique innovators, William R. Miller (director of geodesign services) and Christopher Cappelli (Esri corporate director); and government policy-makers, Xinsheng Zhang (president of IUCN) and Zuoji Dong (director of Planning Division, Ministry of Land and Resources). In total, 38 distinguished guests delivered speeches to an audience of over 500 delegates coming from over 10 countries and 30 provinces in China. Meanwhile, near 100,000 people watched the live video online and were involved in real time interactions through Weibo.com (a Chinese Twitter-like micro-blogging service). To my knowledge, it is the largest international conference on geodesign in China and Asia.

　　The story of this gathering goes back two and half years ago, when Professor Carl Steinitz and I lunched together at the Geo-information Center in Harvard, discussing what is really "geodesign", and why geodesign is important. He defined it simply as a method to "change geography by design". But, as landscape architects, city planners, land use planners and regional planners, and even farmers, we are changing geography by design — so why geodesign?"Sounds we need a conference to talk about that." "Why not in China — the geography is changing rapidly and badly need design?" "We will need to assembly the best experts from around the world to talk about that." This led to Steinitz writing a letter to Jack Dangermond, the founder and president of Esri, seeking a possibility in sponsoring such a conference. Soon after, Stephen Ervin from Harvard also joined the pilot team to pursue this event. We agreed on the theme — Geodesign: Maximizing Beneficial Impacts. Not by coincidence, in September, 2012, Dangermond came to Beijing to see what we were doing here at Peking University and Turenscape. "Ow, what you are doing is all about geodesign." "It is a great idea to have the first Asian geodesign conference here at PKU, and Esri will sponsor it." Dangermond immediately saw the potential of holding the conference here at Peking University and was very supportive. The result is this unprecedented gathering of geodesign pioneers here today.

　　What is geodesign? Why geodesign and for what do we geodesign? Based on the two days’ of intensive discussion among the members of the dream team, who initially defined and are leading this new field of research and practice, and based on my own understanding, I would like to take this opportunity as the conference organizer, to make the following summary:

　　Geodesign is a way of thinking (the what) in finding solutions for complicated spatial problems (for what). Because of their complexity, which goes beyond the human brain’s capacity of cognition and comprehension, it becomes necessary to depend on some systematic geographic information system and spatial analysis tools to compute and assist in coming up with appropriate solutions (the why).

　　The challenges we are facing today are big and becoming more and more complicated: climate change, food security, urbanization, ground water drop, air and water pollution, loss of biodiversity — to name just a few. To solve these problems, we need big data and systematical solutions, which are beyond the capacity of any single human brain. Design, the profession of problem solving, needs to harness the wealth of data available in meeting our modern challenges. Geodesign gives us a way to extend our capability, with the vast information technology, powerful computation tools and big data, multiple shareholders and ever increasing participants, to conceive appropriate solutions to address our present challenges. Geodesign promises to upgrade the professions of design to meet the demands of this era.

　　2013年10月28~29日，地理设计国际会议在北京大学召开，来自世界各地的38位嘉宾发表了演讲。照片中为大会的主旨报告嘉宾（从左至右依次为弗雷德里克•斯坦纳、艾略特•哈特利、威廉姆•R•米勒、隋殿志、史提芬•M•欧文、石川幹子、亨克•J•舒尔滕、卡尔•斯坦尼兹、伊恩•毕夏普、章新胜、矢野桂司、迈克尔•F•古特柴尔德、克里斯托弗•卡佩里、道格拉斯•奥尔森 、董祚继、俞孔坚）（2013年10月28日摄于北京）。

　　October 28th ~ 29th, 2013, Geodesign International Conference was held in Peking University. 38 distinguishedguests from all over the world delivered speeches. Keynote speeches of this conference (From left to right are Frederick Steiner, Elliot Hartley, William R. Miller, Daniel Sui, Stephen M. Ervin, Mikiko Ishikawa, Henk J. Scholten, Carl Steinitz, Ian Bishop, Xinsheng Zhang, Keiji Yano, Michael F. Goodchild, Christopher Cappelli, Douglas Olson, Zuoji Dong, and Kongjian Yu) (Beijing , October 28th, 2013).

原文出处：俞孔坚.(2013).地理设计.景观设计学,1(6):5-7.
Source: Yu, K. (2013). Geodesign. Landscape Architecture Frontiers, 1 (6):5-7.