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Cortinarius varius (Basidiomycota, Agaricales) as indicator species for calcareous coniferous forests.

Cortinarius varius is a well-known and easily identified species belonging to Cortinarius sub-genus Phlegmacium. It forms ectomycorrhiza with Picea abies and is confined to dry and mesic coniferous woodland on nutrient-rich soil and is often abundant in calcareous spruce forests. A study of the occurrence and density pattern of C. varius and its overlap with other red-listed ectomycorrhizal fungi in calcareous spruce forests was conducted in Nordingrå, Ångermanland (N. Sweden). The results indicate that C. varius could potentially serve as an indicator species for this habitat, but results need to be tested in more locations.

In Year 1–3 of the Architecture Pro- gramme, courses in History, Urban Planning, Technology and Theory are closely integrated with the studio work. The supporting studies courses provide tools for the architectural project, expand the notion of Architecture and aims to encourage critical thinking.

During the autumn of 2014 a vacant railroad round house (Lokstallarna) was squatted in the Centre of Umeå – a town located in northern Sweden. In 2008 Umeå had been designated as the European Capital of Culture (ECoC) 2014, together with Latvian capital Riga. Though issues bearing a history of tensions, Umeå had focused its application on the presence of a strong do-it-yourself grassroots culture along with the presence of the indigenous Sámi population in the surrounding regions. During the decade following the designation as ECoC, Umeå went trough a process of rapid urban transformation. Like the previous large urban transformation in the 1970’s and 1980’s, the process continuously sparked resistance from a multitude of citizen initiatives, which might be depicted as a movement around Henri Lefebvre’s slogan of “The Right to the City”. These movements did however not only negate, protest, the various changes in the cityscape, but rather, acted pro-actively in experiments to create space for their own needs, desires and dreams around the notion of commoning. The squatting of the vacant railroad house in the fall of 2014 may be seen as the peak point of an almost decade long cycle of struggles with different cultural associations as the movements main, but not sole, subject(s). Existing for almost two years, the squat was the longest run official occupation of an empty building in Sweden since the shift of the 1980’s and 1990’s. The aim of this paper is to contextualize the Lokstallarna squat in relation to (1) the general local and regional conditions, (2) in a narrative of local actions alike, and to thereafter situate it in the contemporary cycle of struggles of 2008-2015.