拆毁的悖论:家园的失落与日常的损毁
在2024年1月10日,Paris Hilton分享了一段视频,展示了她在洛杉矶大火中被毁的家园。她心碎地走过废墟,并表示更让她心碎的是,这并非孤例,因为有太多人失去了一切。大火摧毁的不仅是墙壁和屋顶,更是那些将房屋变成家的记忆和故事。超过一百万人点赞了她的帖子,表达了同情与支持,这不仅是对她个人损失的关注,也是对她所代表的普遍困境的认同。然而,大多数人并未意识到一个令人震惊的事实:在欧洲,每时每刻,都有房屋被拆毁。这并非源于自然灾害,而是出自人类之手。作为一名专注于翻新(Renovation)的建筑师,我必须指出,建筑被拆毁并非因为它们已破损不堪,无法修复或翻新;也不是为了节省能源或为现有居民建造更好的居所。其根本原因只有一个词:利润(Profit)。
如今,房地产(Real Estate)已成为全球最有价值的资产,绝大多数全球资金都流向了房产的买卖。那么,什么能带来最大的利润?答案是新建的建筑,无论是市中心的公寓还是标志性的办公楼。在金钱的逻辑里,“旧”永远无法胜过“新”。这催生了一个持续的拆毁与新建的循环。在房地产投机者(Real Estate Speculators)的逻辑中,每一栋建筑都可能被拆毁。这一点至关重要,你必须理解:你居住的房屋,只要它能带来更多利润,就可能面临被拆毁的命运。为何如此?因为在投机者眼中,你的房屋仅仅是一种商品(Commodity),一种“物品”。就像一台老旧的烤面包机,你不会选择修理它,而是直接更换。
Original English
On January 10, Paris Hilton shared a video of her house destroyed in the LA fire. Walking through the ruins, heartbroken, she said what breaks her heart even more is knowing that this isn't just her story. Because so many people have lost everything. And its not just walls and roofs that the fire demolished. It's the memories and the stories that made those houses homes. Over one million people liked her post, showing sympathy and support not only for her loss, but for the very idea behind it. Yet there's something that most of us don't realize, which is that every minute, somewhere in Europe, a house is demolished. Every minute. And it's not by wind, floods or fire, but by human hands. And honestly, this is something I don't get because it's not only the walls and the roofs that we demolish, it's the memories, the communities and the sense of belonging that we demolish, too, and all of it at the cost of the people and the planet. So the question is, why do we even demolish buildings? As an architect who works on renovation, I can tell you it's not because these buildings are broken, and it's not because they cannot be renovated or fixed. It's also not because we want to save energy or build better buildings for those who currently live there. In one word, profit. Today, real estate is the most valuable asset in the world. So a majority of the global money flows into the buying and selling of property. And I ask you what promises most profit? New buildings. Central apartments and trophy offices. In the logic of money, the old can never beat the new. And this fuels a constant cycle of demolition for new construction. Because in the logic of real estate speculators, every building is up for demolition. And this is something you have to understand. No, really, every house in which you live that promises more profit is up for demolition. Why? Because to speculators, your house is a commodity. It's a good. And just like an old toaster, you don't fix it, you replace it. So why is demolition so profitable? Well, essentially, it's a question of values. So in our current system, the value of a building is measured only by its price. So in our real estate system, value and price are the same. So if I ask you, what is the value of a house? What is the value of this building? What would be the answer? Well, in a world in which value and price are the same, the answer shrinks to a few economic factors. It’s very simple, it’s square meters and land, location and market potential. So this is the base how real estate speculators calculate. It's the base for the strategy. So they would buy a land, they pay the price for the building, they clear the land, which means they demolish the building. They build anew, so they add the construction costs, and they divide it by the square meters. Essentially, this is what real estate speculation is about: how much profit you can extract from an existing building and how much money you can make once the old building is gone and the new one is built. It's a shockingly cold calculation that turns the profit of tomorrow into a wrecking ball today. And it's based on a spreadsheet that only counts money, and it never asks what a building holds and who lives there.价值错位:价格取代真实的衡量
拆毁为何如此有利可图?这本质上是一个价值(Value)衡量的问题。在我们当前的体系中,一栋建筑的价值仅由其市场价格(Price)来衡量。因此,在我们的房地产体系中,价值与价格被混为一谈。如果我问你,一座房子的价值是什么?这栋建筑的价值是什么?你的答案会是什么?在一个价值与价格等同的世界里,答案会简化为几个经济因素:非常简单,就是平方米(Square Meters)、土地、地理位置和市场潜力。这就是房地产投机者计算的基础,也是他们策略的基石。他们会购买土地,支付建筑物的价格,然后清理土地——这意味着拆毁现有建筑。接着,他们新建房屋,加上建造费用,再除以总平方米数。本质上,这就是房地产投机所做的事情:从现有建筑中榨取多少利润,以及在旧建筑消失、新建筑建成后能赚多少钱。这是一种令人震惊的冷酷计算,它将明天的利润变成了今天的断壁残垣。这种计算基于一个只关注金钱的电子表格,从未询问过建筑承载了什么,以及谁居住在那里。
然而,价值与价格并非同一回事,它们之间存在着本质的区别。因此,问题不应仅仅是:“一座房子的价值是多少?”而更应追问:“你的家园,其价格(Price)是多少?”我们又该如何衡量那些记忆和故事的价值?我们为家庭纽带、生日庆典、与伴侣的争吵以及原谅的时刻,又赋予了怎样的价格?我们又给社区、养育我们的街区、走廊里熟悉的脸庞、友谊,赋予了怎样的价格标签?更宏观地说,我们又如何衡量下一代生存的自由?这些都是拆毁过程中无人提及的隐藏成本(Hidden Costs),是你永远无法在预算或电子表格中找到的。这一切都发生在一个严重的住房危机(Housing Crisis)时代,我们都同意,数百万人正在为寻找可负担的住所而挣扎,年轻人无法搬出父母的公寓,工薪阶层难以维持头顶的屋檐,甚至中产阶级也已无法负担房产。
除了这些挣扎,几乎每个国家都面临着无家可归者(Homelessness)的上升。但受苦的不仅仅是人,地球也在承受痛苦。因为建筑业是地球上最大的二氧化碳排放源(CO2 Emitter),然而却无人谈论。建筑业贡献了38%的排放量,相比之下,航空业仅占约3%,而航空业是我们经常讨论的数字。但它不仅是最大的二氧化碳排放源,也是欧洲最大的废物生产者(Waste Producer)。36%的建筑垃圾来自建筑业,而家庭垃圾仅占8%。因此,拆毁一座建筑所需的所有能源,以及重建一座建筑所需的所有能源,之所以被释放出来,仅仅是因为真正的价值——社会和生态价值——未能在我们的体系中得到核算。于是,我们拆毁建筑,讽刺的是,却同时加热了地球和房地产市场。
Original English
But value and price are actually not the same. There is a difference. So the question shouldn’t only be: What is the value of a house? But the question should also be: What is the price to your home? Now what is the price of the memories and the stories? So which price do we give to family bonds, to birthday celebrations, to also the fights with our partners and these moments of forgiveness? And what price tag do we also put on community, on the neighborhoods that raise us, on the familiar faces in the hallway, on friendship? Or on a larger scale, on the freedom of the next generation to live. And these are the hidden costs of demolition that no one speaks about. The hidden costs that you will never find in a budget or in a spreadsheet. All of it happening in an era of severe housing crisis, where we all agree, where millions are struggling to find an affordable home, where young people cannot move out of their parents' apartments, where working people are struggling to keep a roof over their head, and where even the middle class cannot afford property any longer. And beyond these struggles, homelessness is rising in almost every country. But it's not only the people who suffer. The planet suffers, too, because the building sector is the biggest CO2 emitter on Earth, yet no one speaks about it. 38 percent come from the building industry, compared to roughly three percent for flying, a number that we discuss a lot, for instance. But it's not only the biggest CO2 emitter, it's also Europe's biggest waste producer. 36 percent of all the waste comes from the construction industry. And again, to put it in context, compared to only eight percent from private households. So all the energy it takes to demolish a building and all the energy it takes to rebuild a building is only unleashed because the real values, the social and the ecological values, are not accounted in our system. So we are tearing down buildings and ironically, heating up both the planet and the housing market.实践范例与变革呼唤
建筑师本身也身处这个价值链之中,参与到房地产投机和为新建而拆毁的循环中。但作为公民,我正承受着日益升高的气温和不断上涨的租金所带来的后果。那么,整个价值链如何才能进化?我们如何通过以不同的视角审视我们已有的事物来进化价值链?这变得非常有趣,因为我们身边究竟有什么?事实上,欧洲已经建成。这才是真正的好消息。欧洲已经建成。为什么?因为二战后,我们推行了使重建快速、廉价且容易的政策。这个体系基本上基于三个关键支柱:紧急政策、工业化方法和公共资金,所有这些都以新建为目标。即使我们日常生活中没有注意到,这个体系至今仍在制定规则。它训练我们看到风险而非潜力,它仍然让我们认为“新”总是优于“旧”。它根植于我们的法律体系,不仅降低了市场利润,也使得翻新和改造变得更加困难,因为从税收激励到补贴,从建筑规范到监管,再到风险保险和信贷,都倾向于“从零开始”。
那么,如果我们换个角度看问题,会发生什么?现在我们知道了问题的根源在于法律体系,市场在此基础上构建其策略,我们也了解了其后果,现在是时候问:我们如何改变它?我认为,重要的是要理解,我们人类发明了这个系统,所以我们必须让它为我们服务,而不是我们为系统服务。这就是法国建筑师Lacaton and Vassal所做的。他们以不同的视角审视已有的事物。对他们而言,每一栋建筑都是遗产(Heritage),并非因为其建筑风格,也不是因为曾有名人居住于此,而是因为他们认识到建筑中蕴含的社会和生态价值。Lacaton Vassal从不拆毁建筑。他们进行增建(Add)、搭建(Build on)、翻新(Renovate)和改造(Transform)。通过这样做,他们承认了墙壁和屋顶中储存的所有能量,从思想、劳动到历史积淀,乃至二氧化碳。我想展示他们的一项工程,它证明了翻新和改造是一个真实可行的替代方案。
我们回看之前展示的那栋房子,它是法国的一处社会保障性住房(Social Housing),位于波尔多的Grand Parc。Lacaton Vassal与Druot和Hutin Architects一起改造了这530套公寓。他们是如何做到的?所有居民在建筑翻新期间都留在了原地。他们使用了预制构件,并通过起重机安装。这些构件像架子一样堆叠在现有建筑前方,几乎就像一个书架立在旧建筑的外面。第二步,他们打开了旧的立面,用大的滑动门取代了狭小的旧窗户,将室内空间向外延伸至新的阳光房(Winter Gardens),让空间充满光线和空气,同时也创造了一种慷慨感。这是一种社会姿态(Social Gesture),你为那些此前不曾拥有的人创造了慷慨和绝佳的视野。其数据令人惊叹:放置预制构件只需半天;打开旧立面需要两天;安装新立面需要两天;内部翻新需要一周。也就是说,只需两周时间就能改善每个人的生活,降低供暖账单,并促进当地从事翻新工作的企业。而这一切的成本,仅为标准新建公寓的三分之一。一套公寓的翻新成本为55,000欧元,而新建成本则高达165,000欧元。标准新建公寓永远不会拥有阳光房,也无法提供他们工作中能够实现的慷慨空间。这证明了最可持续的房屋就是已经建成的房屋。我想展示改造后的图像,这也是我邀请大家想象这一切可能发生在欧洲各地的时候。这可能发生在世界各地,因为它是一个真正系统性的替代方案(Systemic Alternative),实际上可以在任何地方运行。
现在,有些人可能会想:“嗯,这是一个不错的故事,但它不适用于我的房子,因为我住的是独栋房屋,或者我在城市街区拥有一套老旧的公寓。”这可能是真的,这可能不是你的方式。但作为一名建筑师,我可以向你保证,几乎对每一栋建筑来说,都有被翻新和改造的方法。所以,这可以成为你的故事。但是,这里有一个“但是”:只有当我们成功改变那个维持旧价值体系的法律体系(Legal System)时,才有可能实现。我们必须认识到,真正的创新(Innovation)和真正的进化(Evolution)在于发现并认可现有事物中的价值。因为拆毁建筑,就像食物浪费、动物实验或一次性塑料一样,已经过时了。这些都是我们社会已经达成共识并理解的事物。这就是为什么我们说必须创造一个新系统。我们必须创造一条共同的道路,并专注于一个集体目标:在现有建筑中安顿欧洲。
为此,我们发起了一项倡议,一项欧洲公民倡议(European Citizens Initiative),这是一个泛欧项目,拥有一个明确的任务:翻新,而非投机(Renovate, don't speculate)。我们的运动旨在成为最大的建筑倡导组织,推动新法律,使翻新和改造成为新的常态——一种社会、生态,同时也是经济上替代拆毁和新建的方案。这一切都得到了欧盟一亿公民的支持。而“一亿”不仅是我们需要的支持者数量,它也与Paris Hilton帖子获得的赞数相同。所以,我请求大家,如果这么多人能支持一栋在火灾中失去的房屋,请想象一下,如果我们共同努力,能为数百万正面临拆毁的房屋带来怎样的影响。谢谢大家。