ImageStudy

by
Prasenjit Karmakar
“There seems to be a public image of any given city which is the overlap of
many individual images. Or perhaps there is a series of public images, each
held by some significant number of citizens. Such group images are necessary
if an individual is to operate successfully within his environment and to
cooperate with his fellows. Each individual picture is unique. with some
content that is rarely or never communicated, yet it approximates the public
image, which, in different environments, is more or less compelling, more or
less embracing.”

Kevin A. Lynch
The Image of the City, page 46.
Kevin Andrew Lynch
(1918 Chicago, Illinois -1984 Martha's Vineyard ,Massachusetts)
was an American urban planner and author.
His most influential books include :
The Image of the City (1960)
and What Time is This Place? (1972)
The Image of the City
“This book is about the look of cities, and whether this look is of any
importance, and whether it can be changed”.
The book looks at three American cities: Boston, Jersey City, and
Los Angeles.
In the first section, new concepts of legibility and Imageability are
presented to lay the theoretical foundation of the entire book.
Followed by that, Lynch introduced three American cities as examples
to reveal his outcomes of field reconnaissance, and then made
comparisons between each other. In the third section, five elements
and their interrelationships are summarized from previous researches
which act as the core content of the book.
 In Lynch’s view, image can be explained as “a picture especially in the
mind”, a sentimental combination between objective city image and
subjective human thoughts. The productions of environment images are
influenced by a two-way process between the observer and the observed.
The observer, with great adaptability and in the light of his own purposes,
selects, organizes, and endows with meaning what he/she sees. Therefore,
the specific image can be totally different from the different perspective of
observers.
Source : http://newjerseyurbanism.wordpress.com/2010/09/17/the-view-from-the-road/
Source: http://newjerseyurbanism.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/sequence.jpg
To become completely lost is perhaps a rather rare experience for most people
in the modern city. We are supported by the presence of others and by special
way-finding devices: maps, street numbers, route signs, bus placards. But let the
mishap of disorientation once occur, and the sense of anxiety and even terror
that accompanies it reveals to us how closely it is linked to our sense of balance
and well-being. The very word "lost" in our language means much more than
simple geographical uncertainty.
Legibility
The apparent clarity or "Legibility" of the cityscape.
It mean the ease with which its parts can be recognized and can be organized
into a coherent pattern/Just as this printed page, if it is legible, can be visually
grasped as a related pattern of recognizable symbols, so a legible city would be
one whose districts or landmarks or pathways are easily identifiable and are
easily grouped into an over-all pattern.
Principles for effective wayfinding include:
• Create an identity at each location, different from all others.
• Use landmarks to provide orientation cues and memorable locations.
• Create well-structured paths.
• Create regions of differing visual character.
• Don't give the user too many choices in navigation.
• Use survey views (give navigators a vista or map).
• Provide signs at decision points to help wayfinding decisions.
• Use sight lines to show what's ahead.

Source:
http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects/infoarch/publications/mfoltzthesis/node8.html
Imageability
Physical qualities which relate to the attributes of identity and structure in the
mental image. This leads to the definition of what might be called image
ability; that quality in a physical object which gives it a high probability of
evoking a strong image in any given observer. It is that shape, color, or
arrangement which facilitates the making of vividly identified, powerfully
structured, highly useful mental images of the environment.
Kevin Lynch found that there are five basic elements which people use to
construct their mental image of a city:

Pathways
Districts
Edges
Landmarks
Nodes
Paths are the channels along which the observer moves. They may
be streets, walkways, transit lines, canals, railroads.
-Kevin Lynch, The Image of the City.
Edges are the linear elements not used as paths by the observer. They are
the boundaries and linear breaks in continuity: shores, railroad cuts, edges
of development, walls.
- Kevin Lynch, The Image of the City
Districts are the medium-to-large sections of the city which the observer
mentally enters "inside of," and which are recognizable as having some
common, identifying character.
- Kevin Lynch, The Image of the City
Nodes are points, the strategic spots in a city into which an observer can
enter, and which are the intensive foci to and from which he is traveling.
They may be primarily junctions or concentrations.
- Kevin Lynch, The Image of the City
Landmarks are another type of point-reference, but in this case the
observer does not enter within them, they are external. They are usually a
rather simply defined physical object: building, sign, store, or mountain.
- Kevin Lynch, The Image of the City.
Three Cities
The image of the cities Boston, Jersey Cities and Los Angeles derived from the
consensus of verbal interviews and sketch maps.

Boston
Jersey city
Los Angeles
 Urban design study based on theories presented by Kevin Lynch in The Image of the City.
Dublin

Source:
https://www.behance.net/gallery/4980011/Dublin-Urban-Design-Case-Study
 Park street
Park street is located quite central in Kolkata. It is growing out of the old
colonial town towards east and is surrounded by different districts. To the
east there is Salt Lake City, which was foremost built in the early 60s, and
the new developing Rajarhat. North – east the Kolkata international Airport
and the southbound the mainly residential South Kolkata is situated.
A Linear street Parkstreet’s figure ground map
Landmarks
Pathways
Edge
Nodes
Nodes & Junctions
Thankyou