Planning Theories advocated by

Eminent Planners

Constantious.A.Doxiadis

Doxiadis

Greek urban planner, designer, and consultant on Ekistics ( 191375 )

Ekistics, the science of human settlements, the study of the manifold facets of
human life and action in the natural setting of Man's environment in the universe

A practical meeting-ground for planners of human settlements, architects,

engineers, sociologists, anthropologists, economists, psychologists, historians,
biologists, geologists. Anyone who pursues any of these studies is infact studying
Ekistics

C. A. Doxiadis enjoyed international acclaim not only for his extensive practice but
also for his planning theories

In 1937 he was appointed Chief Town Planning Officer for the Greater Athens
Area and during the war (1940-1945) held the post of Head of the Department of
Regional and Town Planning in the Ministry of Public Works while also serving as
a corporal in the Greek Army

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

"Human settlements are no longer satisfactory for their inhabitants"

Doxiadis concluded that the elements of contemporary cities, such as

transportation, zoning and communication, were no longer in balance. As a
result, people suffered in cities that were too large, crowded and noisy, and
that exacted too much damage on the surrounding natural environment

To solve these problems, Doxiadis proposed a new field of inquiry, the

science of ekistics

Doxiadis envisioned ekistics, a name that derives from the ancient Greek
term eikizo meaning "creating a settlement," as an interdisciplinary effort to
"arrive at a proper conception and implementation of the facts, concepts,
and ideas related to human settlement

Ekistics, the journal which he founded, continues to publish articles on a

wide range of urban topics

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

Society is a total systems of

relationship, visible or invisible which
forms Network

The goal of Ekistics is to achieve

the balance in the elements of
human settlement inorder to
guarantee the happiness and safety
of Anthropos

The findings and proposals were not

to remain on the theoretical sphere,
but were also to provide a frame and
guidelines for proper planning for
any place and for any foreseeable
time horizon; proper planning for
Anthropos and his well being

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

The greatest problem facing cities worldwide was the problem of managing
growth. He argued, that city planners made inadequate provisions for urban
growth and as a result cities would grow like cancers, the inner core eating
into surrounding neighborhoods and the outer edges gobbling up the natural
landscape

Doxiadis worked for more than a decade to establish an interdisciplinary

community of scholars who would complete research on cities and the best
ways to manage them

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

After World War II he created many bold designs for towns and settlements
built throughout Greece

Among his book publications are Ekistic Analysis (1946), Between Dystopia
and Utopia (1966), and Anthropopolis (1975)

His ideas are expressed in diverse projects as Islamabad, the capital of

Pakistan

The future is a continuation of the past. We cannot eliminate our biological,

social, economic and cultural inheritance. We have, moreover, to look to the
past and the future, for they are a continuum and anyone looking in one
direction gets confused

Published a magazine called "Regional Planning, Town Planning and

Ekistics"

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

In 1945 he also served as Greece's representative to England, France and

the United States on the problems of postwar reconstruction

Doxiadis served as a Undersecretary and Director-General of the Ministry of

Housing and Reconstruction (1945-48), and subsequently as MinisterCoordinator of the Greek Recovery Program and Undersecretary of the
Ministry of Coordination (1948-51)

In 1951 he founded Doxiadis Associates, the company grew rapidly until it

had offices on five continents and projects in 40 countries, acquiring its legal
form as DA International Co., Ltd., Consultants on Development and
Ekistics, in 1963

From 1958 to 1971 he taught ekistics at the Athens Technological

Organization and lectured at universities all over the United States as well
as at Oxford and Dublin

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

To reach a better understanding of the problems related to human

settlements by studying their past history

Served as the Director of the Athens Center of Ekistics, personally

supervised the research

The research would cover Ekistic phenomena in the wider, not the narrow,
sense of the term, in order to deal with the development of settlement from
its start, from the selection of the space for mans living, to its completion
and artistic expression through buildings and monuments. We would
attempt to cover the entire phenomenon of our life system which exists
behind these, as represented by geography, history, man and his life, the
multitude of their expressions in space

Eminent Planners

Doxiadis

Planners must concentrate above all on making humane cities

Doxiadis was optimistic that with proper planning the cities of the world
would eventually mature into a stable and pleasant form he called the
ecumenopolis

ECUMENOPOLIS is finally acknowledged by the international scientific

community, which is now accepting the urbanization developments foreseen
by Doxiadis 30 years ago

Eminent Planners

Planning Strategies

He proposed several solutions for rapidly growing cities, one of which was
for city planners to leave room for expansion of the city core along a
predetermined axis so that most urban expansion would be channeled in a
single direction

This innovation would release the population pressure on the urban core
while leading to a more orderly development of the outlying area

In cases where multiple metropolitan areas were growing together as a

megalopolis, he suggested that new self-contained urban centers be
created within the urban sprawl with improved communication and
transportation links between them

Eminent Planners

Planning Strategies

Doxiadis concluded that planners must find ways to restore human scale to
large cities. Some of his proposals included :

Limiting all buildings to three levels or less, with permission to build higher
bestowed by national authorities

Separating automobile and pedestrian traffic completely, with automobiles

consigned to underground conduits if possible

Constructing cities as a "beehive" of cells each no bigger than 2 by 2

kilometers, the maximum comfortable distance for pedestrians

The New Urbanism movement of the 1980s and 1990s, which suggested
that small pedestrian friendly villages should replace typical suburban
developments, echoed many of Doxiadis' suggestions

Eminent Planners

Questions, Comments, Thoughts

Thank You

Ar.Ajai
Chandran.C.K