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2003: A Motorway Odyssey

Part 2 Project 2003
Nicholas Robert Birch
 University of Liverpool | UK
This thesis began as a road trip.

Initially, we travelled the 225 miles of the M6 sketching, filming, interviewing and analysing the sometimes surreal and often unexpected, clandestine activities of motorway service stations.

A second road trip, travelling the A1 (France), proved a vital comparison. We discovered a clear rationale of the whole route with service areas broken down into types. Adopting this technique and applying it to the M6 the motorway and the stations became a narrative, working together as a whole.

Subsequently our investigation took on a more detailed approach analysing one station, Lancaster Forton. Studies of the site coupled with the notion that the car is a substitute for our home environment, led to the insertion of fragmented elements of the home, (sleeping, lounging and cooking), in an attempt to address the issues of scale, familiarity and context.

In portraying our proposal to rationalise the M6 we constructed an installation/room that expressed elements of the domestic along with our film, drawings, research and overall intention of our journey.



This is clearly one of the most exciting, methodically interesting and intellectually engaging projects of the academic year. It began with an intention to understand the nature of motorway service stations on M6. To start off, Nick and Sarah undertook a journey up and down the motorway, meticulously recording – through a video diary and through interviews – many aspects of the world that these constitute. In that process, they discovered facets of the service station life we never envisaged had existed; also they captured a range of shady deals being carried out under the twilight sky. To have a basis for comparison, they visited the A1 in France undertaking a similar journey through this busy European motorway and once again producing a video diary. The two sets of experiences were compared carefully to understand the issues and problems of the M6. The ones on the A1 were clearly more organised and displayed a sophisticated and user-friendly signage system to go with it; even before stopping at the station the motorists knew what facilities these contained. Based on the observations and analysis, Nick and Sarah suggested a reorganisation of the service stations on M6; there were too many of those, too close, trying to provide the same kind of facilities and failing in many cases to impress the consumer. They proposed a system of categories of programmes and events, where beyond providing the basic facilities (such as rest rooms and fuel, which would now be taken out of the rest and located in a clearly demarcated place!) the service stations would have clear focus to the attractions these would offer.

Lancaster Forton was eventually taken up as an example to work with – a product of the 1960’s naïve faith in the image of space technology and automation, the building could have easily formed part of the world of the Jetsons. The students’ intention was to develop a programme that would investigate and address such enthusiasm for the technology of speed and futurism, within a modern context. It was decided that various car-centred event spaces, such as a ‘crash-testing centre’ with live and playback observation facilities, as well as, a ‘car showroom restaurant’, would be introduced. On another scale, the students were also interested in the characteristics of ‘Non Places’ (taking Mark Augé’s cue, it was defined as places having differing characteristics from places that we have grown accustomed to knowing and understanding, such as dwellings, institutions, etc., but not a negation of ‘Place’), to which motorway service stations, alongside airports, belong. From that perspective, defining the specificity of the ‘service station’ became important. They felt that the nature of such a ‘Non Place’ could only be articulated when these are contextualised through the characteristics of ‘Places’. The quintessential ‘Place’, the dwelling with its specific elements of ‘sleeping’, living’ and ‘cooking’, was introduced into the project. The ‘sleeping’ element was grafted into the car park allowing for rest zone (which also speculated on the possibility of many unplanned and fringe activities, such as prostitution), while the ‘living’ element was introduced as galleries for the ‘crash-testing centre’ and the ‘cooking’ element found its place within an innovative ‘car showroom restaurant’, allowing a complex interweaving of consumption through eating and enjoying the cars. The project culminated in a beautifully fabricated installation that captured the process and the central intentions.

2003
First study route, analysing, filming and sketching the 225 miles of the m6, incorporating 12 service stations.
The study proposed a strategy linking the service areas on the M6 into a narrative whilst simultaneously examining one site in detail; Lancaster Forton Services.
The M6, along with its service areas, was compared to the A1 autoroute in France between Lille and Paris. New service area types were discovered and informed our proposals on the M6.
The investigation of the service areas revealed unexpected behaviour and hidden elements. The project developed a language of icons to communicate both the conventional and the unorthodox/surreal!
Three films were made: one on the M6, one on the A1 in France and one walking around Forton Services. All analysed different scales and speeds of travelling and became a continual visual diary of the project.
Element 1. Rest bunker/bedroom located in the main car park northbound.
Section showing parking space, steps up to elevated walkway (leading to services) and rest bunker (with M6 northbound to the right).
Car park walkway leading to services with surveillance camera observing M6 northbound.
Element 2. Observation box/living room and crash test centre propulsion chute, with “crash” taking place in the ground floor of the existing service station.
Observation boxes clamped to the side of the crash test propulsion chute.
Image showing relationship of observation box interior to crash test propulsion unit and public walkway.
Interior view of crash test propulsion chute with surveillance cameras recording the performance of the car from every possible angle, producing over 2000 frames a second.
Long section through site showing proposed new subterranean services (including washrooms, shop and restaurant); crash test chute and centre and the existing tower (element 3. car showroom/restaurant).
Concept cars displayed in the existing tower conceal the seating for the restaurant.
Access for the ‘concept cars’ to the showroom is via a new sky bridge leading to a lift platform at the rear of the existing tower.
The showroom indulges the fascination and desire for the machine and speed coupled with the more sensory representation of cuisine.
Element 4. The built installation inserts a windscreen /viewer through which one can watch the final film within a domestic environment. A screen on the exterior ensures that the inhabitant’s actions are surveyed and recorded.
The interior contains elements of the domestic; a standard door (framing part of the drawing), a shelf, a fake plant, a carpet, general proportions and scale. Simultaneously it houses a windscreen, a projector and an existing column in the gallery.
An inhabitant viewed in the installation from the screen on the exterior.
The windscreen/viewer allows new interpretations and views of familiar domestic objects whilst framing the road trip film.
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