Take Shape is a publication driving the streets of architectural, legal, and political thinking. Its second issue looks at the subjective and daily experience of transportation — the commute. At a time when most cities’ public transportation systems are barely scraping by, billionaires are whimsically proposing hyperloops and space travel. Take Shape looks at this disconnect, and the ways in which transportation can be improved outside of the model of entrepreneurial investment, through community-driven planning and increased state funding.
In this issue:
- A collaborative community redesign of a Los Angeles train station by LA-Más
- A photographic archive of entrances to New York subway stations by Robert Prochaska
- Jesse Barron challenges the whims of Jeff Bezos and his fool’s errand in outer space
- Vanessa Kowalski traces the history of Poland’s state-funded hitchhiking system
- A golf cart ride through Kraków’s tourism industry by Eliza Levinson
- Three short essays look at how design serves the interests of the wealthy on the move
- A dialogue between Kafka and airport security
- Shipped Ships, a temporary ferry service and artwork by Turkish artist Ayşe Erkmen
- A proposal to reinvest in a national rail system by Danya Sherman
- A criticism of the WeWork and WeLive empires by Patrick McAndrews.
- Luiza Dale reflects on the fetish of design manual reprints, especially the New York City Transit Authority Graphics Standards Manual
- Conversations with Chicago-based bicycle and anti-gentrification activist Lynda Lopez and researcher Alex Karner on the economic and racial history of Atlanta’s public transportation systems
