AR6711-URBAN DESIGN

UNIT-1

INTRODUCTION TO URBAN DESIGN

SYALLAPUS:
URBAN DESIGN:

• Urban design is concerned with the arrangement, appearance and function of our
suburbs, towns and cities. It is both a process and an outcome of creating localities in
which people live, engage with each other, and engage with the physical place
around them.

• Urban design involves many different disciplines including planning, development,

architecture, landscape architecture, engineering, economics, law and finance,
among others.

• Urban design operates at many scales, from the macro scale of the urban structure
(planning, zoning, and transport and infrastructure networks) to the micro scale of street
furniture and lighting.

• When fully integrated into policy and planning systems, urban design can be used to
inform land use planning, infrastructure, built form and even the socio-demographic
mix of a place.

• Urban design can significantly influence the economic, environmental, social and
cultural outcomes of a place:

• Urban design can influence the economic success and socio-economic composition of
a locality—whether it encourages local businesses and entrepreneurship; whether it
attracts people to live there; whether the costs of housing and travel are affordable; and
whether access to job opportunities, facilities and services are equitable.

• Urban design determines the physical scale, space and ambience of a place and
establishes the built and natural forms within which individual buildings and infrastructure
are sited. As such, it affects the balance between natural ecosystems and built
environments, and their sustainability outcomes.

• Urban design can influence health and the social and cultural impacts of a locality:
how people interact with each other, how they move around, and how they use a place.
ELEMENTS OF URBAN DESIGN:
This diagram shows the approximate hierarchical relationship between the elements of urban
design, followed by a brief definition of each of the elements. The section below provides basic
explanations for terms that are commonly used for urban design.

URBAN STRUCTURE:

• The overall framework of a region, town or precinct, showing relationships between

zones of built forms, land forms, natural environments, activities and open spaces.

• It encompasses broader systems including transport and infrastructure networks.

URBAN GRAIN:

• The balance of open space to built form, and the nature and extent of subdividing an
area into smaller parcels or blocks.

• For example a ‘fine urban grain’ might constitute a network of small or detailed
streetscapes. It takes into consideration the hierarchy of street types, the physical
linkages and movement between locations and modes of transport.

DENSITY + MIX:

The intensity of development and the range of different uses (such as residential, commercial,
institutional or recreational uses).

HEIGHT + MASSING:

• The scale of buildings in relation to height and floor area, and how they relate to
surrounding land forms, buildings and streets.

• It also incorporates building envelope, site coverage and solar orientation.

• Height and massing create the sense of openness or enclosure, and affect the amenity
of streets, spaces and other buildings.

STREETSCAPE + LANDSCAPE:
The design of public spaces such as streets, opens spaces and pathways, and includes
landscaping, microclimate, shading and planting.

FACADE + INTERFACE:
The relationship of buildings to the site, street and neighbouring buildings (alignment, setbacks,
boundary treatment) and the architectural expression of their facades (projections, openings,
patterns and materials).

DETAILS + MATERIALS:
• The close-up appearance of objects and surfaces and the selection of materials in terms
of detail, craftsmanship, texture, colour, durability, sustainability and treatment.

• It includes street furniture, paving, lighting and signage. It contributes to human

comfort, safety and enjoyment of the public domain.
PUBLIC REALM:
• Much of urban design is concerned with the design and management of publicly used
space (also referred to as the public realm or public domain) and the way this is
experienced and used.
• The public realm includes the natural and built environment used by the general
public on a day-to-day basis such as streets, plazas, parks, and public infrastructure.
• Some aspects of privately owned space such as the bulk and scale of buildings, or
gardens that are visible from the public realm, can also contribute to the overall result.
• At times, there is a blurring of public and private realms, particularly where privately
owned space is publicly used.

TOPOGRAPHY, LANDSCAPE AND ENVIRONMENT:

• The natural environment includes the topography of landforms, water courses, flora
and fauna—whether natural or introduced.
• It may be in the form of rivers and creeks, lakes, bush land, parks and recreational
facilities, streetscapes or private gardens, and is often referred to as ‘green
infrastructure’.

SOCIAL + ECONOMIC FABRIC:

The non-physical aspects of the urban form which include social factors (culture, participation,
health and well-being) as well as the productive capacity and economic prosperity of a
community.
It incorporates aspects such as demographics and life stages, social interaction and support
networks.

SCALE:
• The size, bulk and perception of a buildings and spaces. Bulk refers to the height,
width and depth of a building in relation to other surrounding buildings, the street,
setbacks and surrounding open space.
• For example, a large building set amongst other smaller buildings may seem ‘out of
scale’.

URBAN FORM:
The arrangement of a built up area. This arrangement is made up of many components
including how close buildings and uses are together; what uses are located where; and how
much of the natural environment is a part of the built up area.
NEED FOR URBAN DESIGN:
Design can help to enhance a city’s assets:
• Physical needs of citizens;
• Safety, security and protection;
• An environment free of pollution, noise, accidents, and crime;
• A conducive social environment ..a sense of community;
• An appropriate image and prestige;
• Creativity and self-expression in neighbourhoods;
• Aesthetically pleasantness as a place of culture and a work of art.

URBAN ISSSUES:

1. Urban unemployment:

• An individual, who is ready and willing to work at the prevailing rate of wages but does
not find the work, is considered to be unemployed. It is important here to mention that
the persons, who voluntarily remain unemployed: living on alms or spending a parasitic
life, cannot be treated as unemployed.

• Unemployed persons, in urban areas, are quite often registered with employment
exchanges. It is so the urban employment, unlike disguised unemployment of rural
areas, is more like an open unemployment.

• The number of registered unemployed, between 1961 and 2008, has soared up more
than eight-fold. Unemployment in urban areas can further be separated into two broad
categories:

1. Industrial Unemployment

2. Educated Unemployment

1.1 Industrial Unemployment:

• This sort of unemployment envelops the persons, who are willing and able to
work in industries, mining, transport, trade and construction activities but do not
find the job.
 • The problem of unemployment in industrial sector has increased many fold
because of a rapid rise in population.

• Besides this, the trend of migrating to urban areas, mainly due to the expansion
of industries in urban areas, in search of jobs has compounded the problem of
unemployment in the industrial sector.

• So it can be claimed that industrial unemployment happens as a spill over of

rural unemployment.

• The second major cause for this problem is that industries in India are increasing
rapidly and they are emulating the use of labour-saving western technology,
thus, in the process, limiting the absorption capacity of the industrial sector.

1.2 Educated Unemployment:

Major factors contributing to educated unemployment are:

• It has been recorded that the number of educated persons has increased
substantially due to the expansion of educational institutions such as universities,
college and schools.
• It is important to take note of the fact that quite often degree holders fail to acquire a
job, because the education system in India is not job-oriented; it is rather degree-
oriented.
• Enhancement in employment opportunities has lagged behind in comparison with the
enhancement in the volume of educated labour force.

2. Insufficient of waste disposal and collection:

• The conditions, issues and problems of urban waste management in the

industrialized and developing worlds are different.

• Though the developed countries generate larger amounts of wastes, they have
developed adequate facilities, competent government institutions and bureaucracies
to manage their wastes.
 • Developing countries are still in the transition towards better waste management but
they currently have insufficient collection and improper disposal of wastes.

• Services and programmes that include proper waste disposal for management of
hazardous biological and chemical wastes, minimisation and recycling will be
needed.

• Disposal of wastes is commonly done by dumping (on land or into water bodies),
incineration or long term storage in a secured facility.

• All these methods have varying degrees of negative environmental impacts with
adverse environmental and health risks if wastes are improperly disposed or stored.

3. Urban Poverty:

It is a situation resulting from a group of factors, we can say is the lack of opportunities
given by the inhabitants of an area because of the configuration of the urban landscape
in which they live or transit. When a mixture of all this is present you have a poor
urban space and people who lives there are urban poor.

4. Inadequate of water and sanitation facilities:

• In many cities people get water from the municipal sources for less than half an
hour every alternate day. In dry summer season, taps remain dry for days together
and people are denied water supply at a time when they need it the most.

• The individual towns require water in larger quantities. Many small towns have no
main water supply at all and depend on such sources as individual tube wells,
household open wells or even rivers

• Urban areas in India are almost invariably plagued with insufficient and inefficient
sewage facilities. Not a single city in India is fully sewered. Resource crunch faced
by the municipalities and unauthorised growth of the cities are two major causes of
this pathetic state of affairs.
5. Urban Transportation:

5.1 Traffic Movement and Congestion:

• Traffic congestion occurs when urban transport networks are no longer capable
of accommodating the volume of movements that use them.

• The location of congested areas is determined by the physical transport

framework and by the patterns of urban land use and their associated trip-
generating activities.

• Levels of traffic overloading vary in time, with a very well-marked peak during the
daily journey-to-work periods

5.2 Public Transport Crowding:

• The ‘person congestion’ occurring inside public transport vehicles at such peak
times adds insult to injury, sometimes literally.

• A very high proportion of the day’s journeys are made under conditions of peak-
hour loading, during which there will be lengthy queues at stops, crowding at
terminals, stairways and ticket offices, and excessively long periods of hot
and claustrophobic travel jammed in overcrowded vehicles.
5.3 Off-Peak Inadequacy of Public Transport:

• If public transport operators provide sufficient vehicles to meet peak-hour

demand there will be insufficient patronage off-peak to keep them
economically employed.

• If on the other hand they tailor fleet size to the off-peak demand, the vehicles
would be so overwhelmed during the peak that the service would most likely
break down.

5.4 Difficulties for Pedestrians:

• Pedestrians form the largest category of traffic accident victims. Attempts to

increase their safety have usually failed to deal with the source of the problem
(i.e., traffic speed and volume) and instead have concentrated on restricting
movement on foot.

• Needless to say this worsens the pedestrian’s environment, making large areas
‘off-limits’ and forcing walkers to use footbridges and underpasses, which
are inadequately cleaned or policed. Additionally there is obstruction by parked
cars and the increasing pollution of the urban environment, with traffic noise and
exhaust fumes affecting most directly those on feet.

5.5 Environmental Impact:

• The operation of motor vehicles is a polluting activity. While there are
innumerable other activities which cause environmental pollution as a result of
the tremendous increases in vehicle ownership, society is only now beginning to
appreciate the devastating and dangerous consequences of motor vehicle
usage. Pollution is not the only issue.

• Traffic noise is a serious problem in the central area of our towns and cities and
there are other environmental drawbacks brought about through trying to
accommodate increasing traffic volumes.

• Traffic noise is both annoying and disturbing. Walking and other activities in
urban areas can be harassing and, perhaps more important, traffic noise
penetrates through to the interior of buildings.

5.6 Atmospheric Pollution:

• Fumes from motor vehicles present one of the most unpleasant costs of living
with the motor vehicle.
 • The car is just one of many sources of atmospheric pollution and although
prolonged exposure may constitute a health hazard, it is important to view this
particular problem in perspective.

6. Urban Crimes:
• Modem cities present a meeting point of people from different walks of life having
no affinity with one another.

• Like other problems, the problem of crimes increases with the increase in
urbanisation.

• In fact the increasing trend in urban crimes tends to disturb peace and
tranquillity of the cities and make them unsafe to live in particularly for the
women.

7. Urban Sprawl:
• Urban sprawl or real expansion of the cities, both in population and geographical
area, of rapidly growing cities is the root cause of urban problems.

• In most cities the economic base is incapable of dealing with the problems
created by their excessive size.

• Massive immigration from rural areas as well as from small towns into big cities
has taken place almost consistently; thereby adding to the size of cities.

8. Housing:

• Overcrowding leads to a chronic problem of shortage of houses in urban areas.

• This problem is specifically more acute in those urban areas where there is large
influx of unemployed or underemployed immigrants who have no place to live in
when they enter cities/towns from the surrounding area
ASPECTS OF URBAN SPACE:

• Aesthetics

• Safety and security

• Infrastructure

• Environmental factors

• Green spaces

• Transport

1. Aesthetics:

• The most beautiful are the result of dense, long lasting systems of prohibitions and
guidance about building sizes, uses and features.

• These allowed substantial freedoms, yet enforce styles, safety, and often materials in
practical ways.

• Many conventional planning techniques are being repackaged using the contemporary
term SMART GROWTH.

2. Safety and security:

• Cities have often grown onto coastal and flood plains at risk of floods and storm
surges. Urban planners must consider these threats.

• Extreme weather, flood, secure emergency evacuation routes and emergency

operations centers.

• Many cities will also have planned, built safety features, such as levees, retaining
walls, and shelters. Some city planners try to control criminality with designed
structures.

3. Infrastructure:

• Access

• Clean drinking water •

• Wage system •

• Disposal system •

• Electricity

• The Smart Growth seeks to:- •

 • Improve quality

• Reduce the cost

• Reduce the co2

4. Environmental factors:

• Environmental protection and conservation are of utmost importance to many planning

systems across the world.

• Not only are the specific effects of development to be mitigated, but attempts are made
to minimize the overall effect of development on the local and global environment.

• This is commonly done through the assessment of Sustainable urban infrastructure and
microclimate.

5. Green spaces:

• Urban open space is often appreciated for the recreational opportunities it provides.

• Recreation in urban open space may include active recreation (such as organized sports
and individual exercise) or passive recreation, which may simply entail being in the open
space.

• Time spent in an urban open space for recreation offers a reprieve from the urban
environment.

6. Transportation:

• Transport within urbanized areas presents unique problems.

• The density of an urban environment increases traffic, which can harm businesses and
increase pollution unless properly managed.

• Parking space for private vehicles requires the construction of large parking garages in
high density areas. This space could often be more valuable for other development.
Articulation of need for space:

The creative articulation of space is the most prominent aspect of urban design. The following
artistic principles are an integral part of creating form and spatial definition:

Order
Unity
Balance
Proportion
Scale
Hierarchy
Symmetry
Rhythm
Contrast
Context
Detail
Texture
Harmony
Beauty

OBJECTIVES OF URBAN DESIGN:

• Aesthetics: Strong Visual Impact
• Development: New Investment. Employment opportunities
• Functional Efficiency
• Improved Environmental conditions
• Safety (ref. Safer Cities Program; CEPTED)
• Guardianship and Space standards
• Technical Solutions to unique problems
• Cultural Identity and symbolism
• Community Integration
• Character: A place with its own identity
• Continuity and Enclosure: A place where public and private spaces are clearly distinguished
• Quality of the Public Realm: A place with attractive and successful outdoor areas
• Ease of Movement: A place that is easy to get to and move through
• Adaptability: A place that can change easily
• Legibility: A place that has a clear image and is easy to understand
• Diversity: A place with variety and choice

There are four Objectives:

1. To minimise the opportunity for crime and help to reduce the fear of crime for residents in
their homes and public spaces.
2. To consider the needs of the most vulnerable groups in society (the elderly, children, women,
disabled people and ethnic minority groups) above others. This is because fear of crime
disproportionately affects these groups and greatly hampers their chances of enjoying the
environment and taking a full part in community life.
3. To achieve reductions in crime across the community, not simply the displacement of crime
from one area to others.
4. To create a more sustainable environment by ensuring ease of maintenance, long life and
adaptability.

SCOPE OF URBAN DESIGN:

The need for UD as a discipline has arisen as a result of the fundamental cultural, political,
social and economic changes. Other issues include the impact of environmental issues and
quality of life on the nature of the city and how urban form can best be adapted to our current
and future needs. It has proved difficult to provide a simple, commonly accepted definition of the
scope of UD.

1. Ecological Significance: Urban Design involves modifying the natural environment. It largely
deals with the quality of built environment that are vital for preserving nature. It can be effected
positively or negatively; more emphasis on pedestrian circulation; relevance of site (like contour
site). Neighborhood concept – everything in 10 minutes reach by walking.
2. Economic Significance: Due to competition, quality of built environment is the key factor that
significantly affects local, regional and international image of countries and sets the stage for all
economic activity. As Harvey points out that there is string relationship between technological
changes in the economic production and structural changes in the quality and production of
urban spaces. Here we can consider the concept of smart cities (fully hi-tech designs).

3. Social and Cultural Significance: An important factor determining why people choose to visit,
invest in or relocate to a particular place is the “atmosphere” or the “cultural” identity (eg-
Chandigarh or Goa)

Ensure high quality: To raise the quality of life by providing a high

quality built environment commensurating with the
natural setting.
Embrace robustness: To give a set of robust guidelines on urban design
enduring over time.
Encourage dynamism: To encourage Hong Kong's spirit on pluralism and
dynamism.
Accommodate flexibility: To give flexibility for innovative ideas and
possibilities.

References & Bibliography:

Jonnathan Barnett - Introduction to Urban Design, Harper &Row, Publishers, 1982.

“Time Saver Standards for Urban Design”, Donald Watson, Alan Plattus, Robert Shibley, 2003

www.udg.org.uk/about/what-is-urban-design

www.urbandesign.org/elements.html
HISTORY OF URBAN FORM

UNIT-II

INDIAN CONTEXT
 Evolution of Urbanism in India
Temple Towns
Medieval cities
Mughal city form
Colonial Urbanism
Urban spaces in modern cities

Evolution of Urbanism in India:

• Most of the early civilization have sprung on the banks of some navigable rivers or at
any natural port which not only provide security to the town but also acted as a
communicating link from one civilization to another.

• Physical Safety and communication links are the two prime factors which lead to the
development of towns.

• The earliest civilizations were seen on the banks of rivers like Nile, Ganga, Sindhu.

• Towns flourished since prehistoric times in India. Even at the time of Indus valley
civilization, towns like Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro were in existence.

The second phase of urbanization began around 600 BC. It continued with periodic ups
and downs until the arrival of Europeans in India in 18th century.

Urban historians classify towns of India as:

• Ancient

• Vedic

• Medieval
• Pre-independence (colonial)

•Post-Independence

Ancient period:

• Ancient period is considered to be between 3000-5000 BC .

In this period, so many towns were created with some unique features.

• Development of towns taken place like

1. Indus valley civilization

2. Vedic towns

3. Buddhist towns is considered to be the ancient period

Indus valley civilization: (3000 B.C)

• It was located on the bank of river Indus(presently in Pakistan) and Ravi.

• In 1920, excavation was done by a British Archeologist in Indo-Gangatic region.

• He found that there is an old city/civilization and there was human settlement named
Mohenjo-Daro (which means Hill of Deads).

• It was covering an area of about 260 hectares with Harappa(on bed of river Ravi) now
in Pakistan; Kalibangan in Rajasthan; Lothal, Sukortada and Dholavira in Gujarat;
Rakhigadhi in Haryana, shows that it was developed around 4000-3000

Salient features of Indus Valley Civilization:

1. Street of 9m width divided the city in 12 blocks each of 365m x 244m.

2. Layout of street was based on ‘grid-iron’ pattern.

3. Series of houses were arranged around open-to-sky central court.

4. They dependent fully on ventilation and roof lighting.

5. Houses with G+1 storey made of kiln-brick with complete bathing establishment.

6. City had effective system of drainage.

7. It had a Great bath of 7m width, 12m length and 2.4m depth made of bricks at bottom
and was made waterproof by providing layers of bitumen and it formed to be part of
ritualistic bathing forming part of Hindu temple.

MATERIALS:

• Lived in pits

• Molded mud bricks were used to line the dwellings

• Bricks were used to make square and rectangular houses

• Houses with G+1 storey made of kiln-brick

STREETS:

• The streets were broad varying from 9 feet to 34 feet

• Lanes were joined with the streets

• Each lane had a public welt

• Street lamps were provided for welfare of public.

• Street of 9m width divided the city in 12 blocks each of 365m x244m.

• Layout of street was based on ‘grid-iron’ pattern

DRAINAGE SYSTEM:

• The elaborate drainage system

• Each house had horizontal and vertical drains
• House drains emptied themselves into the main drains which ran under the main
streets and below many lanes
• There were underground drains for the streets
• These drains were covered by stone slabs
• The soak pits were made of bricks
• The house drains were connected with road drains
GREAT BATH:

• 7m width, 12m length and 2.4m depth

• Made of bricks at bottom and was made waterproof by providing layers of
bitumen and it formed to be part of ritualistic bathing forming part of Hindu temple
 VEDIC PERIOD

Vishwakarma prakash(town planning)

“Shilpshastra” wrote by “Architect Mansara” discussed study on soil, topography,

climatology and various layouts like

• Dandaka
• Swastika
• Padmaka, Nandyavarta
• The main roads were aligned east-west to get the roads purified by air.
• Short roads were aligned in north-south direction. Roads running around the
village were preserved for priests
• Moats were all around the town to secure the town for outside forces

TOWN PLANNING

• Sthapatya Veda (part of Atharva Veda) - layout of a city

• Smriti Shastra - street layouts (micro & macro)
• Vaastu Shastra - treatises on architectural planning
• Arthashastra - environmental management
• Manasara Shilpa Shastra – Grama Vidhana & Nagara Vidhana
• A traditional city designed according to the principles of sacred geometry
was based on cosmological theories. – Vaastu Purush Mandala

Silpasasthras refers to four distinct categories of habitation settlements within the forts
and fortified cities;

• Janabhavanas : houses for common mass

• Rajbhavanas : palaces and gorgeous mansions for ruling class.
• Devabhavanas : religious shrines.
• The public buildings such as public rest house, public gardens, public libraries,
public tents, reservoirs, and wells
• Ancient town classification: according to shape and purpose
• Dandaka
• Nandyavarta
• Sarvatobhadra
• Swastika
• Prastara
• Padmaka
• Karmukha
• Chaturmukha

DANDAKA:

• Literally means a phalanx or a staff.

• It is usually a rectangular or square.
• Its streets are straight and cross each other at right angles.
• No. of streets vary from one to five running parallel to each other.
• Town offices and panchyats are located in the eastern portion of the town.
• This type of town is considered auspicious for Brahmins
• 300 Brahmin families.
SWASTIKA :

o Based on mystic figure swastika.

o There are two streets passing through center.
o Traversing streets are planted in clock wise direction.
o Ramparts defend the village and a ditch is to enclose these rampart
NANDYAVARTA:

• It may be square or Oblong

• It is divided in 4 main vitthis
• The town has four large streets along the sides.
• Five or seven sets of such streets, with a row of houses on each side.
• The lanes which are traverse between the main roads should have no houses
• Vithis is a streets which is lined with houses.
• Small roads are at interval of six or seven rajjus ( 1 Rajju = 10 dandas = 60 feet).
• Usually streets are 3,4 or 5 dandas wide.
MADURAI:

o The old city of Madurai is considered to be designed according to the

Rajdhani plan, described in Manasara, one of the Shilpasastra, and has the
fivefold concentric rectangular formation with Meenakshi- Sundareshwara
Temple at a very centre point.

o The city was a well planned one with bazaars and many broad streets with
high and luxurious mansions on both sides.

o The city was built around the temple complex as the focal point with a
combination of a concentric street pattern

o The streets concentric to the temple complex formed the major streets viz.,
Chithirai Streets, Avani Moola Streets and Masi Streets.

o The next order of streets is perpendicular to the above streets and lead to the
temple entrances.
o The developments within and beyond these streets are on an irregular pattern

o A definite hierarchy of street pattern was adopted with the width of the Streets
decreasing as they branched out, ending up in stone paved streets and lanes
the width of some being just 0.60 m.

o The entire city was enclosed within the fort walls and surrounded by a moat.

o The fort walls have been razed down and the moat filled up to form the
present day Veli Streets.

o Settlement pattern-
o Caste and occupational hierarchies.

o Amman Temple is at the center

 o Royal Palaces, Brahmins and Priests at the first concentric rectangle

o Traders, Kishatriyas and Vaishnavaites on the second rectangle

o Lower caste Sudras and immigrants zoarashitrains in the third rectangle.

SARVATOBHADRA- (Thanjavur)
• It is oblong or square and divided into interlineal chambers
.

• In center temple dedicated to Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva is located

• No. of car streets varies form one to five with a boulevard going around the
village

• Pavillions, Rest houses, colleges halls at several corners

• Town is secured by a wall and a ditch with four large gates on the sides and
many gates at corners

• Hamlets for vaisyas and shudras should be allotted towards the south

• Drapers and weavers have their quarters in between west and the south west
• Blacksmits are to be quartered between varuna and vayu and further

• opposite to them are fishermen and the butchers.

• Physicians are to assigned between Vayu and Soma.

• Huts of chandalas and outcastes in the further outer proximity

• Tanks and reservoirs should be constructed either in south or in the

intermediate quaters
PRASTARA –

• Space is divided into 4, 9, or 16 wards by a network of streets

• These streets vary from 6,7, 8, 9, or 11 dandas
• In wards roads are planted in chess board system
• But they are not divide in equal no of plots.
• Division was according to degree of rank or wealth of the person.
• The village is enclosed walls and ditches with four principal gates on
south and subsidiary ones in the corners

PADMAKA :-
• Its Length and Breadth are made equal while the enclosing walls are circular or it
can be quadrangular, hexagonal, or octagonal.
 • The divide edifice or council house should be at the center

• Round about this plot should be planted streets no. four to eight and they are line
with houses

• There should be gates in four cardinal directions

KARMUKHA :Poompuhar

• Its shape is semi circular or semi elliptical, like a bow.

• This type of plan is used at sea shore.
• Towns like Pattana, Kheta, or Khavarta are planned in this manner.
• Pattana has preponderance of viasyas.
• Kheta is generally inhabited by Traders and Laborers.
• It has two car streets and one principal streets.
• If bow faces west then one car streets runs from south to east and other from
north to east and principal street runs from west to east and other runs from north
to south.
• Houses range on both side of them.
• It may have desirable no. of gates
CAHTURMUKHA: SRIRANGAM

• It is square or oblong in shape lying east- west.

• There are four car streets on four sides.

• Two large streets crossing at right angles in the center dividing the whole site into four
blocks or wards.

• Four principal gates are raised placed on the terminus of two highways and no. of
supplementary gates at corner.

• Each ward is planted with four smaller roads crossed by same no. of them.

• The south eastern ward is alloted for Brahmins.

• South- western for ruling class.

• North- Eastern and North- western to traders.

• Sudras or artisians and labour class are relegated to the extreme borders

Buddhist period: (up to 320 AD)

• During the period of Emperor Chandragupta Maurya, Kautilya and Chanakya was
the chief minister who wrote the famous “Arthashastra”, a treatise of Town Planning.

Features stated in it were:

1. Regulation of zoning depending on communities.

2. Highway (Rajamarga) to be parallel to the main cardinal direction.

3. Road were aligned in grid-iron form.

4. Rajmarga to be not less than 30 ft. or nearly 3 lanes of traffic.

• The excavation carried out at Patliputra, capital of Magadha (now in Bihar), shows
evidence of advance knowledge of planning.
• Taksha-sila and Nalanda, the renowned place for learning were formed in this
period. •
• Nalanda consist of three main essentials – stupas, temples & hotels for monks. It
had 300 halls for accommodating 10,000 pupils and libraries were nine-storeyed
high.

Medieval period: (350-1500 AD):

FEATURES OF INDIAN MEDIEVAL TOWN:

• No planned and systematic urban growth. Only fortress towns under the
patronage of chieftains and petty rulers could grow.

• Small urban centres was the ‘rule’, and only capitals were having busy life.

• All centres – ‘dasturs’ (districts) as well as ‘parganas’ (tehsils) beside capitals in

nature were also ‘garrison towns’ where armies were invariably stationed for
protection.

• Medieval towns were walled, encircled by an outside moat.

• Medieval town site was usually governed by physically significant terrain; it was
either on a hill flanked on the other side by a water body, or it was guarded by a
ring of mounds.

• Medieval town used to have its first nucleus often as a fortress of walled
property of a landlord, its internal roads being controlled to connect the market
place lying directly before the gate of the castle or place of worship.

• Urban centres of the medieval times were surrounded by agricultural land, and
farmers and labourers commonly were having their dwellings near or outside the
town limit.

• The areas within the walls of a town near its bound were occupied by artisan
castes engaged in handicrafts.

• Wealthy merchants were having their mansions around the market place in the
central area, while the administrative officials and high-ranked army personnel’s’
residences were around the palace or the place of worship.

• The entire structure of a town was divided into socially hierarchical classes
controlled by the chieftain or bishop.

JAIPUR CITY
• The layout of the city of Jaipur wonderfully links the concept of a Shastric city
with the practicalities of the chosen site.

• Grid-iron pattern planning and its location was at the base of the hills

• According to this shastra the site should be divided into grids or mandalas
rangung from 2x 2 to 10 x 10.

• Gives prominence to the cardinal directions.

• Plan of jaipur is a grid of 3x3 with gridlines being the city’s main streets.

• The central axis of the town was laid from East to West between the gates of the
Sun(Suraj pol) and the moon(Chandpol)

• This was crossed by two roads at right angles dividing the town into nine almost
square, almost equally sized blocks, which were further sub divided by lanes and
alleys all at right angles.

• But by building the western boundary of the city right up to the hill’s southern
apex, it provided a continuous line of defense.
• The mandala could not be complete in the NW due to the presence of the hills.

• On the other hand in the SE an extra square has been added that plugged the
gap between the city and the eastern hills.

• The town has around it a masonry wall, 25ft. high & 9ft. thick, with eight gates.

• The palace building covered two blocks, the town six and the remaining ninth
block was not usable on account of steep hills. So this North-West ward was
transferred to the South-East corner of the city, making the shape of the plan as
a whole asymmetrical rather than square.

• The city’s division into nine wards was also in conformity with the Hindu caste
system, which necessitated the segregation of people belonging to different
communities and ranks.

• Following the directions of the Hindu Shilpa shastra, width of the main streets &
other lanes were fixed. Thus the main streets of the city were 111ft. wide,
secondary streets 55 ft. wide & the smaller ones 27ft. wide.

• South of the main road were four almost equal rectangles. The rectangle
opposite the palace has been broken up into two equal and smaller rectangles by
the Chaura Rasta.Thus altogether there are now five rectangles on the south of
the main road called Chowkris.
• The serving class occupied the peripheral areas.

• Another constraint was the position of the lake, which formed a part of the
pleasure garden around which the city was built. This lake lay close to the
hillside. In the original design it fell outside the main block of the city; but due to
Jai Singh’s wish to include the old garden in the city, the lake was made the tank
of palace garden.
• Public spaces can be divided into
• Chaupars
• Bazaars
• Mohallas
• Streets
• Temples

THE MUGHAL PERIOD

• From Akbar ( 1566- 1605) to Shah Jahan

• Shah Jahan established residences in Lahore, Agra and Delhi.

• In 1638, he laid the foundations of new capital, centered around Lal Qila or Red
Fort

• DELHI-The Mughaal Capital

• The site was situated on the western bank of river Yamuna where a natural
projection formed a triangle with the land and the river.

• Muslim Urban Life

• The city was planned according to hind planning principles of shilpashastra from
vastushastra

• The site was placed on a high land as in the shastra and was kamukha or bow
shaped, for this ensured its prosperity

• The arm of the archer was Chandni Chowk. The string was Yamuna river

• The junction of the two main axes is the most auspicious point in the whole
region and was therefore the red fort.

• The city form- morphology elements

• The urban infrastructure was laid out in a geometric pattern.

• The designed infrastructure of Shahjahanabad comprised-

• The fort

• The Friday mosque.

• The two main boulevards.

• The bazaars around the Friday mosque.

• The elaborate system of water channels.

• The major gardens and the city wall.

• MAJOR STREETS - Faiz Bazaar or Akkarabadi Bazaar, was also wide and
straight
• North- south axis and connected Delhi gate of the fort with the city walls Delhi
gate and is about 1km in length.

• These major two streets developed as processional routes, as well as

commercial arteries. The streets also assumed importance for ritual events

• Five Main Streets

• Chandni Chowk and Faiz Bazaar to other gates and to different part of the
walled city.

• The streets were built as the spines of major activities and developed as
commercial thorough affairs. They connected the Ajmeri Darwaza with the
Jami Masjid and Turkman and Lahori Darwazas.

• Their intersections formed a landmark. Important buildings were located on

these arteries. The other streets were less significant and were mainly built as
access roads to the residential areas.
 PRE-INDEPENDENCE-COLONIAL URBANISM

• A grid iron model for colonial town layouts

• Location of ports and routes of railways
• When the Britishers first settled in India, they found most of the towns are
unhygienic. So they built independent colonies on the outskirts of existing towns.
• These extensions were called “Cantonments” and “Barracks” for military
occupied areas and “Civil lines” for the residents of civilians.
• Hence they created these cantonments: – Delhi cantonment known as British
colonies. – Agra cantonment. – Bangalore cantonment. – Ahmadabad
cantonment.
• •After this, they found that the climate of India is so hot. So they developed the
hill- stations in the nearby area of cantonments. They were: – Shimla nearer to
Delhi. – Matheran nearer to Mumbai. – Kodaikanal nearer to Chennai. –
Darjeeling nearer to Kolkata.
• In the first decade of 20th century, they took up the work of building New Delhi.
Plan was prepared based on modern town planning principle by eminent town
planner “Edwin Lutyens”.
 • He also designed Rashtrapati Bhavan.
• The industrial buildings were separated from the residential sector. • Lutyen also
contributed for making “Canaught place” which is the common area having
circular plan.
• Eight main attributes of colonial urban planningwere established:

Deliberate urbanisation as a locus for civil behaviour and to establish control.

1. Towns were pre-planned and imposed on localities without much attention

being given to existing constraints.

2. Grid iron layouts with streets, up to 150ft. (50m) wide were a special feature

3. Public squares were provided for symbolic purposes, to emphasise the status
of the Empire.

4. Towns were divided into 100ft. (30m) wide rectangular plots to minimise

5. fire and health risks.

6. About one tenth -public and sporting purposes, again with the emphasis on
cricket.

7. Green Belt

8. Creation of town, suburban and country building lots.

(Write it own with example of Chennai city)

POST-INDEPENDENCE PERIOD: (AFTER 1947)

• After independence, Jawaharlal Nehru was appointed as the first prime minister of
India.

He invited Le Corbusier to visit India and develop cities. Hence, Chandigarh was
planned by him.

• “Rourkela” & ”Jamshedpur” were also planned by him.

Steel towns-

• Durgapur- West Bengal

• Bhilai- Madhya Pradesh

• Rourkela- Orissa

Industrial towns-

• Jamshedpur- Bihar

• Bhadravati- Karnataka

• Chittaranjan- West Bengal

Capitals-

• Gandhinagar- Gujarat

• Chandigarh- Punjab
 CHANDIGARH

CHANDIGARH – THE CITY BEAUTIFUL

o Some 8000 years ago Chandigarh was a home to the HARAPPANS – it

happened due to the river INDUS.
o The site was a sub mountainous area of the Ambala district about 150 miles
north of New Delhi.
o The area was a flat, gentle sloping plain of agriculture land dotted with
grooves of mango trees, consisting of 59 villages.
o Reasons for planed development
• Mountainous region
• Central location
• Sufficient water supply
• Natural drainage
• Moderate climate
• Shivalk hills.
o The site covers 114 sqmarea approximately.
o The general ground level range between 1000 – 2000 feet
o 1% grade giving a general adequate drainage.

LE CORBUSIER PLANNING STRATEGIES:

• Planned with focus on Urban design, architectural aesthetics, preservation

of natural environment, conservation of buildings and open spaces,
hierarchical road network.
• Divided the HUMAN FUNCTIONS into work, living and leisure with strict
zoning.
• City planning was against the traditional Indian cities.
• Replaces the native Indian town plan into “super blocks”
• Post war – “GARDEN CITY”
• Le modular system
• Analogous to Human body

HEAD - Capitol – Place of Power

HEART - The City Centre

STOMACH - The Commercial area

ARMS - The University and Industrial zone

LUNGS - Leisure valley & Open spaces

ARTERIES - Network of roads

• The primary module of a city’s design is a sector, a neighbourhood unit

of size 800m X 1200m.
• Each sector is a self sufficient unit having shops, schools, health centers
and places of recreation.
• The population of a sector varies between 3000 and 2000 depending
upon the size of the plots and the topography of the area.

PRINCIPLES OF URBAN PLANNING:

• Convenient walking distance for social services like schools and shopping
centers.

• FACILITIES:
o Orderly arrangement of facilities which would be shared
common by the residents.
o A unit having shops, schools, health centers and places of
recreations and worships.
o Blocks are divided in sectors.
o Each sector is self sufficient unit having all facilities.
o These sectors varies depending upon the size and the
topography of the area.

• ROAD SYSTEMS:
o Major roads should not pass through residential
neighbourhood.
o An integrated system of seven road types.
o Pathways for cyclists
o Roads intersect at right angles forming a grid.
o Hierarchy of movement.
o Internal road pattern should encourage quite, safe, low volume
traffic movement.
 ➢ V1 – Fast roads connecting Chandigarh to other towns / BUS
➢ V2 – Arterial roads / BUS
➢ V3 – Fast Vehicular roads / BUS
➢ V4 – Meandering shopping street / BUS
➢ V5 – Sector circulation roads
➢ V6 – Access roads to houses
➢ V7 – Footpaths and cycle tracks.

• LEISURE VALLEY:
➢ A green sprawling space extending north-east to south-west along
a seasonal rivulet gradient and was conceived by Le Corbusier as
the “LUNGS” of the city.
➢ This valley houses the series of fitness trails, amphitheatre and
spaces for open-air exhibition.
➢ Rock garden designed by NekChand in 1957.

• SECTORS:
➢ The basic planning of the city is a sector.
➢ To accommodate 3,000 to 25,000 persons.
➢ 30 sectors are in Chandigarh, of which 24 are residential.
➢ The sectors are surrounded by “High speed roads”, Bus stops every
400m.
➢ The main principle of the sector is that never a door will open on
the surrounding of fast vehicular road.
➢ The size of a sector is based on the concept of No pedestrian need
to walk for more than 10mins.

• BUILDING TYPOLOGY:
➢ The basic typology is extremely rectilinear with similar proportions,
➢ The residential units are arranged around central common green
spaces with different shape.
SERIES OF DEVELOPMENT:
 BUBHANESHWAR

History:
 Bhubaneshwar replaced Cuttack as the capital of Odisha (formerly known as
Orissa) in 1948.
 The government wanted a new city to cater to the capital to house government
officials and bureaucrats.
 They decided to create a modern, planned city.
 Like Chandigarh, Bhubaneshwar is one of modern India’s first planned cities.
 Otto Königsberger,the german architect was chosen as the chief architect for the
new city of Bhubaneshwar as he had been involved in the development of
Jamshedpur and was among the handful of western planners in India at that time

Planning:
 Otto Königsberger realized that India’s rapid population growth was a major
challenge and came up with the idea of a linear city plan,

 to provide for the indefinite growth of a city in such a way that it functions
efficiently at each stage.

 The first such conflict was between him and the government chief architect Julius
Vaz.

 Who wanted to establish a relationship between the old city and new for sharing
of facilities and favoured a radial method of planning.

 The govt wanted the temple architecture of the old city to be taken as an
inspiration for the new city.

 Königsberger’s master plan advocated that each neighbourhood be so designed

that the civic centre could be reached by a walk of not more than 10 minutes
without crossing any main traffic artery to provide safety to children absorbed in
play and women on the way to the market. Vaz designed a majority of the
government buildings like the Assembly, the Secretariat, the Governor’s House
and more without consulting Königsberger.

 Unlike Chandigarh, these buildings do not carry the absolute stamp of the master
planner
 GANDHINAGAR
 In 1960, Bombay state was split in two different states, Gujarat and Maharashtra.
Ahmedabad became capital of Gujarat, and a new capital city was to be built on
land which was once part of Pethapur state.

 The new capital city was planned by Chief Architect H.K. Mewada, and his
assistant Prakash M Apte.

 Both Mewada, and Apte had worked as trainees under legendary architect Le
Corbusier in the Chandigarh Project in the 1950s.

The character of a plan for a new city is influenced by various factors, such as:

 the regional setting, site conditions, dominant function etc.

 Functionally, Gandhinagar was to be the capital city of Gujarat.

 In 1965 the city was planned for a population of 150,000.

 city has been divided into 30 sectors.

 Each sector has its own shopping and community center, primary school, health
center, Government and private housing.

 Apart from which there is a generous provision for wide open green parks,
extensive planting and a large recreational area along the river giving the city a
lush green garden-city atmosphere.

 Gandhinagar's streets are numbered, and have cross streets named for letters of
the Gujarati alphabet (e.g., "k", "kh", "g", "gh", "ch", "chh", "j").

 All streets cross every kilometre, and at every crossing traffic circles decrease
the speed of traffic

 The city has developed in four distinct phases:

 Phase 1: After the city's infrastructure was completed in 1970, and until 1980, it
was known as 'Gandhian City,' since it was based on Gandhi's concepts and
principles.
  Phase 2: Between 1980 and 1990, a time of low pollution, it was known as
'Unpolluted City'.

 Phase 3: After 1990, trees were planted, the city to be 'Green City.'

 Phase 4: In 2002, Gujarat's Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, proposed a new,

triple focus for the city: it should be green, It should use solar energy, and It
should be cosmopolitan.

 These six areas together generates most of the traffic within the city.

 It was therefore necessary to locate each of these in such a way that the total
volume of traffic is well distributed within the city with a balanced pressure on all
traffic routes.

 The government offices have been located to the south-east of the geographical
centre of the city while the industrial area is located to the north.

 The prevailing breeze direction confirmed this location.

 The city centre and the commercial area is situated a little to the north-east of
the geographical centre of the city with the public institutions area in the south

The main work areas in the city are:

 Capital Complex and Government Offices.

 Light Industries Areas.

 City Centre.

 Public Institutions Area.

 Shopping, Commercial and Warehousing area.

 IT Parks

Residential areas:

 The regular pattern of main roads divides the city into rectangular sectors
measuring one kilometre by three-fourths kilometre.

 Each of these sectors will accommodate a residential community of about 7000

persons with the necessary facilities like schools, shopping, playgrounds, and
parks.
 To achieve economy in development costs and facilitate maximum benefit from
social integration the residential units are planned in a compact form

 These residential groups in Gandhinagar have a basic and fundamental

resemblance with the community structure presented by 'Poles' as obtained in
almost all cities of Gujarat.

 Just as is found in the case of these houses in the 'Poles', residential houses are
grouped along a street, which opens out at places for social interaction between
people of all ages as also for a play space for children.

 The street pattern in the residential groups are as informal as is found in 'Poles',
free of fast traffic and serving only the local traffic generated by the residential
groups

 The system consists of a grid (1 km. x 0.75 km.) of motor roads and another grid
(1 km. x 0.75 km.) of cycle pedestrian ways superimposed on each other so that
each residential community is served by motor roads on the periphery and cycle
ways within it.

 Grade separation by an underpass with an easy gradient (1 in 50) at the

intersection of cycle pedestrian ways and motor roads will enable the two
systems to work almost independent of each other
WESTERN CONTEXT
 Morphology of early cities
Greek agora
Roman forum
Medivel towns Renaissance place making
Ideal Cities
Industrialization and city growth
Garnier’s industrial city
The American grid planning
Anti urbanism and the picturesque
Cite industrielle
Citte nuovo
Radian city

GREEK AGORA:
• The Agora - An ancient marketplace. The agora in Athens had private housing,
until it was reorganized by Peisistratus in the 6th century BC.
• It was originally an area inhabited by various families in small houses, will in the
course of the 5th century, be progressively built up, articulated with grand public
buildings around its perimeter, in order to frame and give a point of reference to
the life of the democratic polis, or city-state.
• Agora, in ancient Greek cities, an open space that served as a meeting ground for
various activities of the citizens.
• The name, first found in the works of Homer, connotes both the assembly of the people
as well as the physical setting; it was applied by the classical Greeks of the 5th
centuryBC to what they regarded as a typical feature of their life: their daily religious,
political, judicial, social, and commercial activity.
• The agora was located either in the middle of the city or near the harbour, which was
surrounded by public buildings and by temples.
• Colonnades, sometimes containing shops, or stoae, often enclosed the space, and
statues, altars, trees, and fountains adorned it.
• The general trend at this time was to isolate the agora from the rest of the town. Earlier
stages in the evolution of the agora have been sought in the East and, with better
results, in MinoanCrete (for instance, at Ayiá Triádha) and in Mycenaean Greece (for
instance, at Tiryns).
• In the 5th and 4th centuries BC two kinds of agora existed.
• Pausanias, writing in the 2nd century AD, calls one type archaic and the other Ionic.
• He mentions the agora of Elis (built after 470 BC) as an example of the archaic type, in
which colonnades and other buildings were not coordinated; the general impression
created was one of disorder.
• The agora of Athens was rebuilt to this type of design after the Persian Wars (490–449
BC). The Ionic type was more symmetrical, often combining colonnades to form either
three sides of a rectangle or a regular square; Miletus, Priene, and Magnesia ad
Maeandrum, cities in Asia Minor, provide early examples.
• This type prevailed and was further developed in Hellenistic and Roman times. In this
later period the agora influenced the development of the Romanforum and was, in turn,
influenced by it.
• The forum, however, was conceived in a more rigid manner than the agora and became
a specific, regular, open area surrounded by planned architecture.
• The use of the agora varied at different periods. Even in classical times the space did
not always remain the place for popular assemblies.
• In Athens the ecclesia, or assembly, was moved to the Pnyx (a hill to the west of the
Acropolis), though the meetings devoted to ostracism were still held in the agora, where
the main tribunal remained.
• A distinction was maintained between commercial and ceremonial agoras in Thessaly
and elsewhere (Aristotle, Politics, vii, II, 2). In the highly developed agora, like that of
Athens, each trade or profession had its own quarter. Many cities had officials called
agoranomoi to control the area.
• The agora also served for theatrical and gymnastic performances until special buildings
and spaces were reserved for these purposes.
 • In Athens respectable women were seldom seen in the agora. Men accused of murder
and other crimes were forbidden to enter it before their trials. Free men went there not
only to transact business and to act as jurors but also to talk and idle—a habit often
mentioned by comic poets. In exceptional circumstances a tomb in the agora was
granted as the highest honour for a citizen.

ROMAN FORUM:
• The Roman Forum is a rectangular forum (plaza) surrounded by the ruins of several
important ancient government buildings at the center of the city of Rome. Citizens of the
ancient city referred to this space, originally a marketplace, as the Forum Magnum, or
simply the Forum.
• It was for centuries the center of Roman public life: the site of triumphal processions and
elections; the venue for public speeches, criminal trials, and gladiatorial matches; and
the nucleus of commercial affairs.
• Here statues and monuments commemorated the city's great men.
• The teeming heart of ancient Rome, it has been called the most celebrated meeting
place in the world, and in all history.
• Located in the small valley between the Palatine and Capitoline Hills, the Forum today is
a sprawling ruin of architectural fragments and intermittent archaeological excavations
attracting 4.5 million sightseers yearly.
• Many of the oldest and most important structures of the ancient city were located on or
near the Forum.
• Eventually much economic and judicial business would transfer away from the Forum
Romanum to the larger and more extravagant structures (Trajan's Forum and the
Basilica Ulpia) to the north.
• The reign of Constantine the Great, during which the Empire was divided into its Eastern
and Western halves, saw the construction of the last major expansion of the Forum
complex—the Basilica of Maxentius (312 AD). This returned the political center to the
Forum until the fall of the Western Roman Empire almost two centuries later.

STRUCTURES:
Temple of Saturn,
Temple of Vespasian and Titus,
Arch of Septimius Severus,
Curia Julia,Rostra,
Basilica Aemilia,
Forum Main Square,
Basilica Iulia,
Temple of Caesar,
Regia,
Temple of Castor and Pollux,
Temple of Vesta
• An impressive – if rather confusing – sprawl of ruins, the Roman Forum was ancient
Rome's showpiece centre, a grandiose district of temples, basilicas and vibrant public
spaces.
• The site, which was originally an Etruscan burial ground, was first developed in the 7th
century BC, growing over time to become the social, political and commercial hub of the
Roman empire. Landmark sights include the Arco di Settimio Severo , the Curia , and
the Casa delle Vestali .
• Like many of Rome's great urban developments, the Forum fell into disrepair after the
fall of the Roman Empire until eventually it was used as pasture land. In the Middle Ages
it was known as the Campo Vaccino ('Cow Field') and extensively plundered for its stone
and marble.
• The area was systematically excavated in the 18th and 19th centuries, and excavations
continue to this day.
• Entering from Largo della Salara Vecchia – you can also enter directly from the Palatino
or via an entrance near the Arco di Tito – you'll see the Tempio di Antonino e Faustina
ahead to your left. Erected in AD 141, this was transformed into a church in the 8th
century, the Chiesa di San Lorenzo in Miranda . To your right the 179 BC Basilica Fulvia
Aemilia was a 100m-long public hall with a two-storey porticoed facade.
• At the end of the path, you'll come to Via Sacra , the Forum’s main thoroughfare, and the
Tempio di Giulio Cesare (also known as the Tempio del Divo Giulio). Built by Augustus
in 29 BC, this marks the spot where Julius Caesar was cremated.
• Heading right up Via Sacra brings you to the Curia , the original seat of the Roman
Senate. This barn-like construction was rebuilt on various occasions before being
converted into a church in the Middle Ages. What you see today is a 1937 reconstruction
of how it looked in the reign of Diocletian
• In front of the Curia, and hidden by scaffolding, is the Lapis Niger , a large piece of black
marble that's said to cover the tomb of Romulus.
• At the end of Via Sacra, the 23m-high Arco di Settimio Severo is dedicated to the
eponymous emperor and his two sons, Caracalla and Geta. It was built in AD 203 to
commemorate the Roman victory over the Parthians.
• In front of the arch are the remains of the Rostrum , an elaborate podium where
Shakespeare had Mark Antony make his famous 'Friends, Romans, countrymen…'
speech. Facing this, the Colonna di Foca (Column of Phocus) rises above what was
once the Forum's main square.

• The eight granite columns that rise behind the Colonna are all that remain of the Tempio
di Saturno , an important temple that doubled as the state treasury. Behind it are (from
north to south): the ruins of the Tempio della Concordia , the Tempio di Vespasiano ,
and the Portico degli Dei Consenti .
• From the path that runs parallel to Via Sacra, you'll pass the stubby ruins of the Basilica
Giulia , which was begun by Julius Caesar and finished by Augustus. At the end of the
basilica, three columns remain from the 5th-century BC Tempio di Castore e Polluce .
Nearby, the 6th-century Chiesa di Santa Maria Antiqua , is the oldest Christian church in
the Forum.
• Back towards Via Sacra is the Casa delle Vestali (currently off-limits), home of the
virgins who tended the sacred flame in the adjoining Tempio di Vesta . The six virgin
priestesses were selected from patrician families when aged between six and 10 to
serve in the temple for 30 years. If the flame in the temple went out the priestess
responsible would be flogged, and if she lost her virginity she would be buried alive. The
offending man would be flogged to death.
• Continuing up Via Sacra, past the Tempio di Romolo , you'll come to the Basilica di
Massenzio , the largest building on the forum. Started by the Emperor Maxentius and
finished by Constantine in 315, it originally measured approximately 100m by 65m. Its
currently out of bounds due to construction work on a new metro line.
MEDIEVAL TOWNS:

Life in Medieval Towns and Cities:

• In urban areas there was essentially freedom within the walls. When cities and towns
received their charters, a certain amount of freedom was gained, but it was by no means
a democratic society.

Population and Urban Environment:

• Medieval cities were extremely small by our standards. London had only 10,000-100,000
residents during the medieval period.
• Cities were geographically small with the average about 1 square mile with 300,000
inhabitants.
• The streets were exceedingly narrow and unpaved; mud was common. Sometimes the
main street and market square were cobblestoned.
• Cities and larger towns were usually surrounded by a wall, which enhanced the
separation between urban and rural, but the fields frequently came up to the wall.
• City dwellers would help rural people who came to the city for market.

Buildings:
• The guild hall was a large building and was often the building that housed city protection
until the late middle ages when cannons were introduced.
• Churches were the largest buildings especially in cathedral cities. Cathedrals were the
seat of the bishops of a diocese.
• Generally there were several parish churches and castles that straddled the city walls
with the main gate to the city. Space was at a premium.
• Houses were tiny and clustered closely together. When a story was added to a house
the second story projected out over the first, and so on.
• The results were that houses facing each other on opposite sides of the street nearly
met in the middle and the houses formed a tunnel-like passage way over the street.
• The first floor generally housed the artisans shop with living quarters on the upper floors.
These houses were made of wood; therefore, they burned frequently.
• Fire was a constant threat in medieval cities and towns.

Sanitation and Health:

• Contents of chamber pots were emptied into the streets. With mud streets this presented
a messy problem.
 • With a heavy rain one could hope for a flushing action to wash the excrement to the
river. A light rain only added to the problem. This was a health problem; polluted springs
and wells were common.
• The most commonly consumed beverages were not water but wine and beer. Beggars,
who were seen as social victims, abounded. Disease was viewed as punishment.
Smallpox was endemic, leprosy was common and the victim was segregated.
• Those who operated the cities and large towns were those who had money. These were
guild masters--masters of the guilds of merchants and craft guild masters.

RENAISSANCE PLACE MAKING:

• Place making is a people-centred approach to the planning, design and management of
public spaces. It involves looking at, listening to, and asking questions of the people who
live, work and play in a particular space, to discover needs and aspirations. This
information is then used to create a common vision for that place. The vision can evolve
quickly into an implementation strategy, beginning with small-scale, do-able
improvements that can immediately bring benefits to public spaces and the people who
use them.

• Place making is a multi-faceted approach to the planning, design and management of

public spaces. Place making capitalizes on a local community’s assets, inspiration, and
potential, ultimately creating 1good public spaces that promote people’s health,
happiness, and wellbeing. Place making is both a process and a philosophy.

• The concepts behind Place making originated in the 1960s, when writers like Jane
Jacobs and William H. Whyte offered ground-breaking ideas about designing cities that
catered to people, not just to cars and shopping centers. Their work focused on the
importance of lively neighbourhoods and inviting public spaces. Jane Jacobs advocated
citizen ownership of streets through the now-famous idea of “eyes on the street.” William
H. Whyte emphasized essential elements for creating social life in public spaces.

• Place making is a term that began to be used in the 1970s by architects and planners to
describe the process of creating squares, plazas, parks, streets and waterfronts that will
attract people because they are pleasurable or interesting. Landscape often plays an
important role in the design process.
• Place making can be used to improve all of the spaces that comprise the gathering
places within a community—its streets, sidewalks, parks, buildings, and other public
spaces
• Place making is not just the act of building or fixing up a space; it is a process that
fosters the creation of vital public destinations. It refers to the kind of places where
people feel a strong stake in their communities and commitment to making things better.
 • Place making capitalizes on a local community’s assets, inspiration and potential,
creating good public spaces that pro mote people’s health, happiness, and economic
well-being.

IDEAL CITY:
An ideal city is the concept of a plan for a city that has been conceived in accordance with the
dictates of some "rational" or "moral" objective.

Concept
• The "ideal" nature of such a city may encompass the moral, spiritual and juridical
qualities of citizenship as well as the ways in which these are realised through urban
structures including buildings, street layout, etc.
• The ground plans of ideal cities are often based on grids (in imitation of Roman town
planning) or other geometrical patterns.
• The ideal city is often an attempt to deploy Utopian ideals at the local level of urban
configuration and living space and amenity rather than at the culture- or civilisation-wide
level of the classical Utopias such as St Thomas More’s

History
• Several attempts to develop ideal city plans are known from the Renaissance, and
appear from the second half of the fifteenth century.
• The concept dates at least from the period of Plato, whose Republicis a philosophical
exploration of the notion of the 'ideal city'.
• The nobility of the Renaissance, seeking to imitate the qualities of Classical civilisation,
sometimes sought to construct such ideal cities either in reality or notionally through a
reformation of manners and culture.

Examples
• Examples of the ideal cities include Filarete's "Sforzinda", a description of which was
included in his Trattato di Architettura (c. 1465). The city of Sforzinda was laid out within
an eight-pointed star inscribed within a circular moat.
• Further examples may have been intended to have been read into the so-called "Urbino"
and "Baltimore" panels (second half of the fifteenth century), which show
Classicallyinfluenced architecture disposed in logically planned piazzas.
• The cities of Nicosia and Valletta, whose fortifications were built in the 1560s by the
Republic of Venice and Order of St. John respectively, are considered to be practical
examples of the concept of the ideal city.
• James Oglethorpe synthesized Classical and Renaissance concepts of the ideal city
with new Enlightenment ideals of scientific planning, harmony in design, and social
equality in his plan for the Province of Carolina. The physical design component of the
famous Oglethorpe Plan remains preserved in the Savannah Historic District.
• Late nineteenth-century examples of the ideal city include the Garden city movement of
Sir Ebenezer Howard, realised at Letchworth Garden City and Welwyn Garden City in
England. Poundbury, Prince Charles' architectural vision established in Dorset, is among
the most recent examples of ideal city planning.

Plan of Sforzinda, Filarete, c. 1465

• The yearning for better community in the material, social and spiritual sense is older than
recorded history. This yearning is expressed in the literature of faith, ranging from
Biblical to Vedic scripture, and of secular social reform from Plato to Le Corbusier.
• The search for an Ideal City recurs in all cultures and at every level of expression from
Thomas Moore’s Utopia to web-based learning tools like Quest or the video game Sim
City, both developed mainly in Vancouver.
• This search is almost always associated with the criticism of existing conditions and the
search for new solutions. The vision of creating real improvements through imaginative
planning resonates in just two of the names given to such schemes: the actual
settlement of New Harmony in Indiana and the imaginary Broadacre City.
• The attempt to provide for all human needs and aspirations in an uplifting environment is
highly organized in Le Corbusier's Radiant City project as against the less formal pattern
of Ebenezer Howard's Garden City.
• Each shared extensive landscaping and each have set examples for much modern
urban development - including cities and company towns in Canada. For example,
Kitimat in northern British Columbia was planned by Alcan as a model of urban
settlement and echoed in Tumbler Ridge which was even planned to survive the
termination of the resource development that had instigated its construction.
• At Kitimat, however, the town development suffered what might be called the tragedy of
planning: the slippage from the ideal during the implementation of the plan, including the
abandonment of the social values and community facilities in its original form. That
idealism had helped change Canadian housing policy and especially the provision of
affordable housing, spearheaded by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
• The Ideal City has always helped to illustrate how human habitation and society can be
improved and to inspire effective action.

• The story of the Ideal City can establish criteria and strategies for dealing with the huge
and ongoing increases in urban populations and the new type and scale of problems
they pose for town planning.

• The city is the place where the pulse of new political thought, economic system, cultural,
expression and technological has played out with greatest intensity.

• The power of ideas on society - and its major creation the city - is obvious in the
continuing impact of Aristotle, Buddha, Christ or Marx. The idea of sustainability itself
owes a good deal to early 20th-century thinkers such as R.H. Francé who promoted
biocentrism: the relation of science, technology and society to organic processes.

• The story is summarized in this position paper and accompanying knowledge resource,
each of which is designed to enable people to contribute to thinking out the city of the
twenty-first century.
INDUSTRIALIZATION AND CITY GROWTH:

The era of industrialization

• In both Europe and the United States, the surge of industry during the mid- and late 19th
century was accompanied by rapid population growth, unfettered business enterprise,
great speculative profits, and public failures in managing the unwanted physical
consequences of development.
• Giant sprawling cities developed during this era, exhibiting the luxuries of wealth and the
meanness of poverty in sharp juxtaposition.
• Eventually the corruption and exploitation of the era gave rise to the Progressive
movement, of which city planning formed a part.
• The slums, congestion, disorder, ugliness, and threat of disease provoked a reaction in
which sanitation improvement was the first demand.
• Significant betterment of public health resulted from engineering improvements in water
supply and sewerage, which were essential to the further growth of urban populations.
• Later in the century the first housing reform measures were enacted. The early
regulatory laws (such as Great Britain’s Public Health Act of 1848 and the New York
State Tenement House Act of 1879) set minimal standards for housing construction.
• Implementation, however, occurred only slowly, as governments did not provide funding
for upgrading existing dwellings, nor did the minimal rent-paying ability of slum dwellers
offer incentives for landlords to improve their buildings.
• Nevertheless, housing improvement occurred as new structures were erected, and new
legislation continued to raise standards, often in response to the exposés of
investigators and activists such as Jacob Riis in the United States and Charles Booth in
England.
• Also during the Progressive era, which extended through the early 20th century, efforts
to improve the urban environment emerged from recognition of the need for recreation.
• Parks were developed to provide visual relief and places for healthful play or relaxation.
Later, playgrounds were carved out in congested areas, and facilities for games and
sports were established not only for children but also for adults, whose workdays
gradually shortened.
• Supporters of the parks movement believed that the opportunity for outdoor recreation
would have a civilizing effect on the working classes, who were otherwise consigned to
overcrowded housing and unhealthful workplaces.
• New York’s Central Park, envisioned in the 1850s and designed by architects Calvert
Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted, became a widely imitated model.
• Among its contributions were the separation of pedestrian and vehicular traffic, the
creation of a romantic landscape within the heart of the city, and a demonstration that
the creation of parks could greatly enhance real-estate values in their surroundings.

• Concern for the appearance of the city had long been manifest in Europe, in the imperial
tradition of court and palace and in the central plazas and great buildings of church and
state.

• In Paris during the Second Empire (1852–70), Georges-Eugène, Baron Haussmann,

became the greatest of the planners on a grand scale, advocating straight arterial
boulevards, advantageous vistas, and a symmetry of squares and radiating roads.

• The resulting urban form was widely emulated throughout the rest of continental Europe.
Haussmann’s efforts went well beyond beautification, however; essentially they broke
down the barriers to commerce presented by medieval Paris, modernizing the city so as
 to enable the efficient transportation of goods as well as the rapid mobilization of military
troops.

• His designs involved the demolition of antiquated tenement structures and their
replacement by new apartment houses intended for a wealthier clientele, the
construction of transportation corridors and commercial space that broke up residential
neighbourhoods, and the displacement of poor people from centrally located areas.

• Haussmann’s methods provided a template by which urban redevelopment programs

would operate in Europe and the United States until nearly the end of the 20th century,
and they would extend their influence in much of the developing world after that.

• Population changes also transformed the city. Urban growth reflected the geographic
mobility of the industrial age; people moved from city to city as well as within them. The
new transience led to diverse populations. Migrants from rural areas and newcomers
from abroad mingled with wealthy long-time residents and the middle class. Immigrants
constituted the fastest growing populations in big cities, where industry offered work.
Urban political machines helped immigrant communities by providing services in
exchange for votes. For immigrants, boss politics eased the way to jobs and citizenship.
Most, but not all, city machines were Democratic.

• Just as industrialization and immigration transformed the city, new technology reshaped
it. Taller buildings became possible with the introduction of elevators and construction
using cast-iron supports and, later, steel girders. The first steel-frame skyscraper, ten
stories high, arose in Chicago in 1885. In 1913 New York's Woolworth Building soared to
a height of 60 stories. Taller buildings caused land values in city centers to increase.

• New forms of transportation stretched cities out. First, trolleys veered over bumpy rails,
and steam-powered cable cars lugged passengers around. Then cities had electric
streetcars, powered by overhead wires. Electric streetcars and elevated railroads
enabled cities to expand, absorbing nearby towns and linking central cities with once-
distant suburbs. For intercity transport, huge railroad terminals—built like palaces, with
columns, arches, and towers—arose near crowded business hubs.

AMERICAN GRID PLAN:

HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN GRID

• The grid has been used continuously throughout the world as a development pattern
since Hippodamus first used it at Piraeus, Greece in the 5th century BC.

• A lot happened over the next 2,000 years after that, but in 1682 William Penn used the
grid as the physical foundation for Philadelphia. With that, the grid began its new life in
the new America.
 • Penn’s instructions for laying out his orthogonal plan were simple:

Be sure to settle the figure of the town so as that the streets hereafter may be uniform
down to the water from the country bounds…This may be ordered when I come, only let
the houses built be in a line, or upon a line, as much as may be…

Penn’s use of the grid may have been influenced by Richard Newcourt’s plan for London
following the fire of 1666. However, Penn may have utilized the grid for its indexical qualities.
The grid by its very nature has no built-in hierarchy. Philadelphia was the first city to use the
indexical system of numbers for north-south streets and tree names for east-west streets.
Because of this coordinate system, the intersection at 12th/Walnut has no more or less social or
political meaning than that at 18th/Cherry. Every plot of land is essentially equal to every other.

Over 100 years after Philadelphia, Thomas Jefferson executed the purchase of the Louisiana
Territory. Following the acquisition of such a vast territory came the challenges of subdividing,
selling, and occupying it. It was impossible to survey the entire area ahead of time so Jefferson
devised a system that would make platting and selling achievable from a distance. Jefferson
answered with the grid in the Land Ordinance of 1785. The Ordinance divided the entire
western territory into townships, sections, quarter-sections, and so on. A system of Euclidean
geometry made this possible. Having never stepped foot on their property, someone could point
to a map, make a purchase, and start their wagon westward knowing precisely where they were
going. Today, a cross-country flight will easily show the physical ramifications of Jefferson’s
decision to subdivide our territory upon the grid. The vast majority of America’s western land is
so arranged in logical lattice-work.
Following the precedent of Philadelphia, the grid has been used extensively in a number of
American cities in every one of our now 50 states. Each of these cities, with their own purposes
and reasonings, adopted the grid as their foundation with varying outcomes. In Chicago, the grid
was used as a vehicle to maximize both the speed of development and financial speculation. In
San Francisco, the grid flatly ignored topography and created a city of dramatic hills and valleys.
In Paragonah, Utah, the grid was executed to promote the doctrine of Mormonism. But perhaps
most famous of all American grids is that found in Manhattan. In 1811, the Commissioners
adopted a master street plan that would come to define the city of New York centuries later.

As known now Manhattan did grow and it grew well beyond all expectations within only a single
century. The grid was there to accommodate that growth

In the 1920s, the roles of both the federal government and the States in the development of
towns and cities were refined and codified. Amongst all of the legal changes, two documents
stand out: the Standard City Planning Enabling Act (SCPEA) and the Standard State Zoning
Enabling Act (SSZEA). The SSZEA specifies the creation, adoption, and use of a zoning map.
The SCPEA, on the other hand, specifies the components of a municipal master plan which is
made up of a zoning map and a master street plan. Unfortunately, over the last 80 years judicial
interpretation over what constitutes a “master plan” has allowed the zoning map to replace the
master street plan. Without a master street plan the grid is essentially impossible to execute.
Thus, our American grid’s recent history has been a stagnant one.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE AMERICAN GRID

1. Walkable

With the proper block size, the grid is inherently walkable. Proper block size is the key term
here. Blocks with sides less than about 600 feet and perimeters less than 1,800 feet
agglomerate together to form a connected network that behooves everyone whether traveling
by foot, car, segway, or stroller. By its very geometry, the grid provides the connectivity
necessary for good urbanism.
2. Navigable

Never ask for directions again. The grid gives you an immediate sense of where you are in the
world: left-right, east-west, uptown-downtown. As a bonus, it also gives you a sense of distance.
As long as you know the unit of measure between intersections, the grid behaves like a giant
yard stick.

3. Adaptable

Land uses change constantly. With rectilinear lots and blocks, old land uses can move out and
new land uses can simply plug in.

Take Manhattan, for example. The block at 71st Street and Madison Avenue once
accommodated Lenox farm. Fast forward almost 200 years and that exact same block today
accommodates high-rise apartments, office buildings, and art galleries.

4. Orthogonal

The Commissioners of New York in 1811 recognized this when they chose the grid for
Manhattan:the right sided and right-angled houses are the most cheap to build and most
convenient to live in.The same holds true for skyscrapers as well.

Orthogonal blocks allow objects and land uses to trade places with ease and efficiency. These
geometric efficiencies compound upon each other as you move up in scale: rectangular desks
beget rectangular rooms beget rectangular buildings beget rectangular blocks. This leads to the
next point…

5. Economical

A rectangular block allows you to do the most with the least. The exact same block in
Manhattan has accommodated everything from a farmhouse to a skyscraper.

6. Sustainable

A rectangular block allows you to do the most with the least. The exact same block in
Manhattan has accommodated everything from a farmhouse to a skyscraper.

7. Appendable

With the grid, the method for expansion is obvious; new developments know exactly what form
to take. Since the block is the fundamental unit of the grid, new blocks can append to old in a
logical sequence that can theoretically guide development forever.

8. Historical

The grid is a fundamental part of our American heritage. While the grid has been utilized around
the world for thousands of years, William Penn introduced it to America in 1682 via Philadelphia.
Since then, the grid has made its way across our vast country thanks predominantly to Thomas
Jefferson’s 1785 Land Ordinance. Countless others, from greedy developers to Mormon
settlers, have followed suit. By utilizing the grid, today’s city planners and urban designers can
continue this long lineage of linearity.

CITTE NUOVO- THE NEW CITY:

The Città Nuova apartment building with external elevators, galleries, covered walkways, on
three street levels (tramlines, automobile lanes, and pedestrian walkway), lamps and wireless
telegraph’

• In spring 1914 Antonio Sant’Elia exhibited a series of drawings relating to his utopian
vision of a completely industrialized and technologically advanced Città Nuova (New
City).
• These were shown at an exhibition of Lombard architects and, two months later, at the
exhibition Nuove Tendenze: Milano l’ano due mille (New Tendencies: Milan the Year
Two Thousand).
• His Messagio, a polemical statement, printed in the catalogue, did not mention the words
Futurist or Futurism, but emphasized the need to respond to the new industrial age and
to celebrate the conditions and focal points of contemporary urban life – grand hotels,
railway stations and ports.
• Sant’Elia stressed that it was necessary to reinvent the city as a dynamic entity and to
construct buildings like gigantic machines.
• The drawings can be linked with the Futurists’ celebration of speed and the dynamism of
modern life.
• They convey a total vision of a future metropolis in which streets are no longer confined
to ground level and in which buildings, as tall as American skyscrapers, do not stand
alone (as in New York), but are part of an integrated urban complex.
• Sant’Elia’s drawing style owed much to the conventions of Viennese architecture of
about 1900, especially the widely published designs of Otto Wagner and his students.
• Sant’Elia’s precise and elaborately detailed ink drawings were the result of a process of
preparatory sketches and studies related to their function as exhibition drawings.
 • The apartment building has external elevator shafts linked to the building by a series of
bridges and covered walkways.
• This arrangement accentuates the mechanistic components of the housing block,
making them a dominant aspect of the building’s facade. It is articulated with both flat
and stepped-back walls and is pierced by transportation lines and bridges, which link it
directly to other elements in the city.
• In this way Sant’Elia abolished the notion of the monolithic, free-standing building and
integrated it fully into the complete urban machine. Similarly, he fused different modes of
transport (rail and air) into a single multi-levelled structure with cable cars and elevators,
again emphasizing the mechanistic purpose of the building and its dynamic role within
the life of the city.
• With its symmetrical towers and colossal scale, however, it resembles a cathedral of the
future, a monument to the vision of a future way of living.

RADIANT CITY:

• Le Corbusier’s Radiant City

• Le Corbusier was trying to find a fix for the same problems of urban pollution and
overcrowding, but unlike Howard, he envisioned building up, not out. His plan, also
known as “Towers in the Park,” proposed exactly that: numerous high-rise buildings
each surrounded by green space.
 • Each building was set on what planners today would derisively refer to as “superblocks,”
and space was clearly delineated between different uses (in the above diagram, this
includes “housing,” the “business center,” “factories” and “warehouses”). Le Corbusier’s
ideas later reappeared in the design of massive public housing projects in the U.S. in the
era of “urban renewal.”
• The Ville Radieuse was a linear city based upon the abstract shape of the human body
with head, spine, arms and legs.

• The design maintained the idea of high-rise housing blocks, free circulation and
abundant green spaces proposed in his earlier work.
• The blocks of housing were laid out in long lines stepping in and out. Like the Swiss
Pavilion they were glazed on their south side and were raised up on pilotis.
• They had roof terraces and running tracks on their roofs. The ingenious layout is
intended to make maximum use of minimal space. 337 apartments are arranged over
twelve storeys, interlocking, jigsaw-like.
• Those on one side of the central corridors are entered at a single-aspect lower floor
before ascending up to a double-aspect upper one (as in the plan below).
• Those leading off from the other side open into single-aspect upper floors before
descending to double-aspect lower ones.
• Every flat has a double-height reception room with mezzanine and a deep balcony, and
stretches from one side of the building to the other, looking east towards the hills on one
side and west towards the sea on the other.
• 23 different layouts provide living space for between one and ten people.
Built between 1947 and 1952, Marseille's Radiant City is a different beast altogether.
• Classily designed to a high standard, today it's a fashionable middle-class Mecca and a
vertical township in its own right.

CITE INDUSTRIELLE:
TONY GARNIER:CITY INDUSTRIALLE:

• Tony Garnier designs the plans of an ideal city, called “An industrial city” during his stay
at “Villa Médicis” (1899-1904). Published in 1917, it is a milestone in the 20th century
history of architecture and urban planning.

• Tony Garnier will be rebuked many times by the French Academy for not dedicating his
full energy to his research project, “Tusculum” which concerned the reconstitution of a
Roman city.

• He dedicated himself instead to avant-garde ideas, by working on his modern city

project, designed for about 35.000 inhabitants.

• The “Industrial City” of Tony Garnier, which can be compared to a city of labor, illustrates
the ideas of Fourier.

• Tony Garnier located it in a place that can be identified as being in Saint-Etienne area
(near by Saint-Chamont / Rive-de-Gier), which was heavily industrialized at the
beginning of the 20th century.

• Going against urban conceptions of his time, the architect developed the zoning
concept, dividing the city into four main functions: work, housing, health, leisure.

• The city is located on a rocky headland, the industrial area being clearly separated from
it and located down the headland, at the confluence of a river.

• Four main principles emerge: functionnalism, space, greenery, and high sunshine
exposure.

Tony Garnier'An industrial city'

• Tony Garnier (1869- 1948) was the son of Pierre Garnier the architect of the famous
Paris Opera house that formed one of the focus points of the 19th century transformation
of Paris.

• Garnier studied at the Ecole des Beaux arts that was so much associated with 19th
century eclectic architecture.

• His interest in town planning was sparked of during his stay in Rome after winning the
prestigious Prix de Rome where he met other prize winners that had a lot of interest in
town planning and design.

• Garniers development coincides with the revision of ideas at the Ecole des Beaux arts
under the influence of growing criticism. Working in Rome and living from the stipendium
Garnier developed his plan for an ideal industrial city.
• He got negative comments by the academy because he had deviated completely from
the commission given to him under the Prix de Rome conditions.

• Despite this his work was exhibited in Paris in 1904.Although there were some negative
reactions, the written press and the professional press did not react either in a positive
nor in a negative sense.

• It looked as if his very unconventional work had sparked interest but no one could
catagorize it. Also Garnier was modest, not a strong debater and he did not propagate
strong opinions or make strong statements.

• This in contrast with the arrogance and out loud preaching of opinions by the modernist.
So in history his work fell somewhere in between. It was only first publicized in 1917.

• Only later he was regarded as the fore runner of modernism, but this is only partly true.

• He shared the concern about social questions and the idea that the design of cities as a
whole should be approached rational and that industry had te be seperated from living
quarters.

• On the other hand he showed great sensibility to the symbolic meaning of buildings and
the quality of urban space, something the modernists lacked.

• He also considered the city to be a 'rhizome' where citizens could circulate freely,
whereas the modernists advocated strickt hierarchical road networks and separation of
types of traffic.
• In hind sight Garnier was a 'stand alone' case in urban design. It is amazing to see the
enormous number of drawings Garnier produced, describing the city in detail and
designing every important building as well as numerous housing types. It is by far the
most comprehensive ideal town ever designed.
• The general design of Garniers city shows a seperation between living quarters and
industry and also a separate health centre outside the city.
• This is understandable as 'industry' in his case equals heavy industry with its associated
pollution.
• The main patterns are grids. However the part with living quarters is kept narrow to
minimize distances to nature.This is also the reason why there is no explicit park within
the city. In the centre of the town is a large civiccentre.
• 9 The grid patterns are not 'stamped' all over the city. The design of the civic centre is
based on adispositon of buildings around a central axle.
• This shows elements of classic design. On the other hand all buildings are free standing
and the open spaces are enormous. In the whole of the plan there are few squares, let
alone enclosed squares.
 • The living quarters show an innovative new type of building block with free standing
houses and 'urban villas' (although using this word in this respect is an anachronism) on
an 'island' between streets. This type of building block had been taken up in recent
urban design in the Netherlands.
• The result is that there are no enclosed streets.
• Trees form very much part of the design. Indicating the more important streets and
losely planted within the blocks.
• Garnier has a lot of drawings showing public space in living quarters, indicating that he
cared about everyday living conditions. For the civic centre he only shows the buildings.
• This suggests that he did not consider the design of public space around public buildings
to be a very important matter.

ANTI URBANISM AND THE PICTURESQUE

Antiurbanism :

• Anti-urbanism is a discourse of fear of the city, produced and reproduced via a variety of
negative representations of urban places, and drawing its power from deeply entrenched
pro urban and pro-rural sentiment.

• Industrialisation was the force which triggered anti-urban representations, as the

rampant, unchecked urbanization that characterised the industrial city was widely
perceived to be a profound moral upheaval, an unwelcome disruption to traditional
values, and the intensification of urban malaise.

• Whilst anti-urbanism is a widespread discourse, it is particularly advanced in the United

States, partly because of the influence of major intellectual figures who all treated the
city with suspicion. This article uses the art of Edward.

• Hopper to explain the power of the anti-urbanism discourse, and its implications. It
concludes by offering some comments on recent accusations that writers such as Mike
Davis are reproducing anti-urban discourse in their popular work on contemporary
urbanization.

• Anti-urbanism is best defined as a discourse of fear of the city, and something fuelled by
the impact of images of urban dystopia we see in a variety of media, cinematic, literary,
artistic, photographic – and in the case of the Qashqai, corporate – representations of
urban places.
• It is a discourse that has been around for a long time, in conjunction with the emergence
of the industrial city, and often constructed in relation to the ‘good city’ of the ancient
Greeks, and especially the perceived virtues of rural life. Anti-urbanism is particularly
advanced in the United States in a variety of guises, from the celebration of rural small-
 town kinship and community to the fact that Los Angeles has been completely destroyed
138 times in various motion pictures from 1909 to 1999! Critical analyses of anti-
urbanism are vital if the material consequences of widespread urban fears are to be
exposed and challenged.
• As cultural geographers have argued for a long time now, if we leave powerful
representations unquestioned, then supposedly fixed ‘evidence’ about how a society is
organized can very easily become treated as overwhelming evidence of how it ‘should’,
or ‘must’ be organized.

PICTURESQUE:
• The idea of the picturesque in urban design is the idea of looking at the environment as
a 'picture' or a collection of 'pictures'.
• Analysis is aimed at discovering and categorizing these 'pictures' and design is aimed at
making 'pictures': spatial compositions of buildings and objects. This means this activity
is aimed at the perception of the environment. The idea being that a pleasant
composition can evoke a feeling of well being and thus contribute to a good
environment.

Sequentional analysis:
• In the visual arts, architecture and urban design a sequence is a series of images
expressing a thought or feeling.space-time experience In architecture and urban design
the idea behind sequences is that the represent a certain space-time experience.
• This space-time experience is an unavoidable part of any architecture and urban design.
As the size and scale of design increases it plays a more important role. On e could say
that a very large building complex or city can only be experienced as a sequence
cinematographic view Characteristic for the idea of sequences is the cinematographic
view.
• The environment is interpreted as a dynamic succession of scenes. Together they
constitute a story. In essence sequences are about manipulating experiences and
feelings.
• The most extreme form of this are theme park rides that manipulate visual impressions
but above all impressions of the human system of equilibrium. This leads to what in
psychological terns is called a 'Kinesthetic experience' (the word is a combination of
'kinetic' and 'esthetic').
• The Picturesque tradition found its original impulse in a popular reaction to the changing
face of English cities in the seventeenth century as commercial expansion, social
upheaval, and industrial technology began to transform the medieval royal center into a
crowded, dehumanizing urban catastrophe.
• The shocking spectacle of urban deterioration prompted many observers to comment on
the unseemly state of affairs, particularly in London, where filth and high density
appeared hand-in-hand with crime, licentiousness, and
• social chaos. John Evelyn complained in 1661 that “Catharrs, Phthisicks, Coughs and
Consumptions rage more in this one City than in the whole Earth besides.”
• He suggested that the problem could be ameliorated by planting a greenbelt around the
city which would be “diligently kept and supply’d, with such Shrubs, as yield the most
fragrant and odoriferous Flowers, and are aptest to tinge the Aer upon every gentle
emission at a great distance.”
• 4 In addition to this early proposal for a natural remedy for pollution, Evelyn collaborated
with Christopher Wren on a plan for rebuilding London after the Great Fire. Their plan
relied on a “spider web pattern” which subordinated the grid to a network of boulevards
and plazas.
 THEORISING AND READING URBAN SPACE

UNIT-III

Ideas of Image ability and townscape(Cullen and Kevin Lynch)

Place and genius loci
The city and its artefacts-Aldo Rossi
Social aspects of urban space-Jane Jacobs, William Whyte
IDEAS OF IMAGEABILITY AND TOWNSCAPE:

Kevin Lynch:

Kevin Lynch (1960) pioneered a scientific approach to urban design studying and
analysed the components of urban design parameters and human evaluation. He put
forth the image of the city as a concept which can be perceived, evaluated and
changed.

Ideas of lynch
• He was concerned by the look of the cities and whether this look is of any
importance , or whether this look can be changed.
• He introduced the theory of urban form.
• An urban environment is a complex system of interactions between people
(users) and various surrounding objects
• Lynch described two things important for a subsequent explanation of the whole
theory: first, physical elements of the city and second, the psychological,
mental image of the city.

Wrote 7 books:
1. The image of the city.
2. City sense and city design.
3. Good city form.
 4. Site planning

The Image of the City

Lynch's most famous work, The Image of the City (1960), is the result of a five-year
study on how observers take in information of the city. Using three American cities as
examples (Boston, Jersey City and Los Angeles), Lynch reported that users understood
their surroundings in consistent and predictable ways, forming mental maps with five
elements:

• Paths, the streets, sidewalks, trails, and other channels in which people travel;
• Edges, perceived boundaries such as walls, buildings, and shorelines;
• Districts, relatively large sections of the city distinguished by some identity or
character;
• Nodes, focal points, intersections or loci;
• Landmarks, readily identifiable objects which serve as external reference points.

In the same book, Lynch also coined the words "imageability" and "wayfinding".
Image of the City has had important and durable influence in the fields of urban
planning and environmental psychology.

Three main concepts of visual communication

1. Imageability and Legibility

2. Environmental images and urban life

3. Bottom-up strategy

Legibility and Imageability:

• Legibility means the extend to which the cityscape can be ‘read’

• People who move through the city engage in way-finding

• Thus, they need to be able to recognize and organize urban elements into a
coherent pattern.

“In the process of way-finding, the strategic link is the environmental image, the
generalized mental picture of the exterior physical world that is held by an individual.
This image is the product both of immediate sensation and of the memory of past
experience, and it is used to interpret information and to guide action.

• The image of the urban-scape has to be perceived by the observer

 • Imageability and legibility leads to identification of a structure and therefore a
precise identity;

• This is necessary to analyse an urban system and its own elements;

• Elements include: path, landmark, edge, node and district

Environmental images and urban life:

• People perceive cities through their social experiences

• Jersey City Experiment – to make rapid description of the city

• Common results from the experiment:

a. Common interest for panoramas and smaller landscape features noted with care
and attention;

b. Shapeless places, which although not pleasant, seem to be remarkable and

striking

From the experiment, what evidently arises is that each individual image constitutes a
connection between urban forms and what is, on a more global extent, the public
image. Each of those images is constructed and relying on the 5 elements, which are:

• paths: the channel of the observer; routes along which people move throughout
the city

• edges: breaking in continuity with the surrounding areas

• districts: areas characterized by common characteristics

• nodes: strategic points for orientation like squares and junctions

• landmarks: external references of orientation, usually a easily identifiable

physical object in the urban landscape

A legible mental map gives people:

• important sense of emotional security

• it is the framework for communication and conceptual organization

• heightens the depth and intensity of everyday human experience

The city itself is thus a powerful symbol of a complex society.

An environmental image has three components:

 1. Identity - the recognition of urban elements as separate entities

2. Structure -the relation of urban elements to other objects and to the observer

3. Meaning - its practical and emotional value to the observer.

4. They should design the city in such a way that it gives room for three related
‘movements’: mapping, learning, shaping.

5. First, people should be able to acquire a clear mental map of their urban
environment.

6. Second, people should be able to learn how to navigate in this environment by

training.

7. Third, people must be able to operate and act upon their environment.

Bottom-up strategy:

Bottom-up method – starting from individual elements to reach gradually the whole.

This strategy would be set to aim at continuity, regularity, measurability and

kinesthetic quality, which is the first to provide identity over a continuous experience
through time.

CULLEN:
• Gordon Cullen studied architecture at the Royal Polytechnic Institution, but never
qualified as an architect.
• He started his career working as a draughtsman in various architectural practices
before spending a couple of years in Barbados.
• He then returned to Britain and joined the Architectural Review as Assistant
Editor in 1946. He later became a writer on planning policy and contributed
numerous editorials and case studies in urban and rural planning.

Townscape:
• His major contribution to the field of urban design is his 1961 Townscape.
• Like most of Cullen’s work, this book deals with the “art of relationship”
between the various components of the urban landscape.
• The purpose of this art is “to take all the elements that go to create the built
environment: buildings, trees, nature, water, traffic, advertisements, and so
on, and to weave them in such a way that drama is released”. (Cullen, 1961,
p.9)
 • Cullen’s approach to urban design is therefore primarily visual, but it is also
based on the physical relationship between movement and the environment:
“the scenery of towns is often revealed in a series of jerks or revelations.”
(Cullen, 1961, p.9) It is for this reason that Cullen developed the concept of serial
vision. This method of representation can be used as a tool for surveying,
analyzing and designing.

A serial vision is a series of sketches that represent the changes and constrasts in the
character of the built environment that one experiences when moving around the city.
The sketches should be shown along with a map identifying the ‘journey’ and the
viewpoints from which the sketches are drawn.

In Cullen’s own words, “the even progress of travel is illuminated by a series of

sudden contrasts and so an impact is made on the eye, bringing the plan to life”.
(Cullen, 1961, p.17). As you will see in Unit 1.3., this is close to Fleming's idea of the
town as narrative.
The concept of serial vision and, generally speaking, Cullen’s approach, can be applied
to design as much as it can serve survey and analysis : “if […] we design our towns
from the point of view of the moving person (pedestrian or car-borne) it is easy to see
how the whole city becomes a plastic experience, a journey through pressures and
vacuums, a sequence ofexposures and enclosures, of constraint and relief.” (Cullen,
1961, p.10)
But design does not solely rely on visual methods. Cullen’s book is a fine example of
the importance of using specific vocabulary when describing the built environment:
 Im
eagibity:

• Imageability is related to “sense of place.” Gorden Cullen (1961, p. 152)

elaborates on the concept of sense of place, asserting that a characteristic visual
theme will contribute to a cohesive sense of place and will inspire people to enter
and rest in the space.
Jan Gehl (1987, p. 183) explains this phenomenon using the example of famous
Italian city squares, where “life in the space, the climate, and the architectural
quality support and complement each other to create an unforgettable total
impression.” When all factors manage to work together to such pleasing ends, a
feeling of physical and psychological well-being results: the feeling that a space
is a thoroughly pleasant place in which to be.
• Imageability is influenced by many other urban design qualities—enclosure,
human scale, transparency, complexity, coherence, legibility, and linkage—
and is in some way the net effect of these qualities.
• Places that rate high on these qualities are likely to rate high on imageability as
well—the neighborhoods of Paris or San Francisco, for example. However,
places that rate low on these qualities may also evoke strong images, though
ones that people may prefer to forget, such as boring industrial parks or strips of
faceless shopping centers.
 • Urban designers focus on the strength of positive images in discussing
imageability and sense of place.

PLACE AND GENIUS LOCI:

 According to Christian Norberg-Schulz, a genius loci was referred to by the

Romans as a protective spirit of a place in the classical period.

 Can be defined as the cognition of one’s surroundings, often used in relation to

the characteristics that make an area unique.

 It also relates to the authenticity of human attachment and belonging to a space.

 The Romans believed that there was a geist, that would protect a place, and this
spirit has certain characteristics or a singular characteristic.

 Architecturally the genius loci is a distinctive atmosphere or characteristic of a

place.

 Certain places draw many onlookers and observers while others may be
desolate and empty.

 But both situations may contain a genius loci that is it’s own distinctive
characteristic, that could be completely unrelated to its physical location.

 Light, sounds, form, or usage; the possibilities of the distinctive atmosphere

could be endless and as complex or simple as you could define.

 Each city has a unique ‘spirit of place,’ or a distinctive atmosphere, that goes
beyond the built environment.

 This urban context reflects how a city functions in ‘real time’ as people move
through time and space.

 The architecture and physical infrastructure of a city give way to the rhythms of
the passing of the day and transition of the seasons. This provides the
‘temporal spectacles’ that define a city.

 This context of a city is more formally known as ‘genius loci,’ or the genetic
footprint of a place.

 One could logically apply 'sense of place' to an urban high street; noting
the architecture, the width of the roads and pavements, the plantings, the style of
the shop-fronts, the street furniture
  Gordon Cullen, transformed the Architectural Review polemic into an analytical
and design tool.

 Townscape was “the art of relationship”; it was important to take all the
elements that go to create the environment:

 buildings,

 trees,

 nature,

 water,

 traffic, advertisements and so on, and to weave them together in such a way that
drama is released.

 For a city is a dramatic event in the environment.

THE CITY AND ITS ARTEFACTS:

ALDO ROSSI (1931-97): THE ARCHITECTURE OF THE CITY

• Ever from its evolution, mankind has built favorable surroundings with its roots in
its civilization.

• These built forms transform themselves over the years overlapping the theme of
its own development and thus there is a contrast in the existence of the
structure over time.

• The change of nature of the ‘urban artifact’ may diminish the value of the
evolution, overriding the rational design of ‘locus’.

• Richness of the history is the characterstic of an urban artifact, its auspicious

character and omnious moments of life makes it an indispensable part of the city.

Rossi is primarily concerned with the form of a city which is the summary of its
architecture.

Two different hypotheses are taken here to mean the architecture of the city.

• Firstly Rossi finds city as a manmade object, a work of engineering and

architecture.
 • Second, certain more limited but still crucial aspects of the city, such as urban
artefacts, which like the city itself are characterized by their own history and
thus by their own form.

Primary elements and dynamics of urban elements

• Rossi defines urban artefacts as primary elements because their existence has
contributed to the morphological and cultural evolution of the city.

• Any element capable of accelerating the process of urbanization in the city is a

primary element, including an empty space.

Theory of Permanence:

• Rossi hypothesised the city as a giant man-made object produced in the

process of time.
• The persistence of the city is revealed through 'monuments’ as well as
through the city’s basic layout and the plans.
• Cities tried to retain their axis of development by maintaining the position of
their original layout and growing according to the direction and meaning of
their older artefacts.

City as a spatial system:

• City is conceived as a spatial system composed of many parts.

• Residential area is one of such elements in the total form of the city.
• It is closely attached to nature and evolution of a city, and constitutes the
city’s image.

History and the Collective Memory:

• The history is the ‘collective memory’ of people of the city and it has an
important influence on the cityitself.
• The history expresses itself through the monuments.
• Sometimes myth precedes the history of a city and thus become important.
• Athens is the first clear example of the science of urban architecture and its
development through history which is initiated by a myth.
• According to Rossi Rome reveals total contrasts and contradictions of the
modern city; but Athens remains the purest experience of humanity, the
embodiment of condition that can never recur.

The Locus:
 • The locus is conceived of a singular place and event, which works as the
relationship of architecture to the constitution of the city and the relationship
between the context and monument.
• Usually locus is the conditions and the qualities of a space necessary to
understand an urban artefact.
• On the other hand, architecture shapes a context, which again constitutes
changes in space.

SOCIAL ASPECTS OF URBAN SPACE:

JANE JACOBS:

• The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961)

• It attacks the principle and objectives of modernism, orthodox city planning

and rebuilding of US post war

• Best ideas on liveable cities originate from observations of city life rather than
deductive theories or master plans (which was the radical new approach in US
during the 1960s)

Urban planning in post-war period:

• Increase in suburban style living in the mid-1950s with increasing number of

automobile and federally subsidized motorways

• While the land values in the suburbs were booming, downtowns were
decaying more and more as former city dwellers began to shop in the new
enclosed malls that were developed in the brand-new suburbs.

• Public transportation systems continues to deteriorate as more people were

driving automobiles

Impacts of suburbanization:

• Decreased population in urban cores, but suburbs grew rapidly

• Jobs lost in central cities

• Merchants abandoned main streets for stop locations along highways

 • White collar jobs in suburbs, whereas dirty industries left in city center

• Public housing in the form of huge high-rises

High-rise living:

• New York’s first housing projects in 1930s – high rise for luxury tenants

• Housing poor in high rises as most cost-efficient modelled on the “tower in the
park” design of Le Corbusier.

• Corbusier proposed that the city’s messy, short blocks be eliminated to be

replaced by huge mega-blocks spaced farther away in order to provide better
and healthier living conditions.

• High-rise buildings was the only way to tackle the problem of increasing
concentration of people in the cities.

Issues with orthodox planning – Jacobs:

• Monotonous projects in the “wrong” areas in the cities;

• Expressways dissecting great cities;

• “urban renewal” destroying livable neighborhoods and their social fabric by

dispersing their residents and destroying small businesses;

• Planners using financial incentives to achieve large-scale projects with a high

“degree of monotony, sterility and vulgarity” (Jacobs, 1961, p.7)

Power of observation – Jacobs:

• To understand how cities work, Jacobs uses inductive reasoning and closely
observes city life;

• Inductive thinking is an activity that can be engaged in by ordinary, interested

citizens;

• Ordinary people relying on their observations – through judgment and

experiences.

• “This ubiquitous principle is the need of cities for a most intricate and close-
grained diversity of uses that give each other constant mutual support, both
economically and socially. The components of this diversity can differ
enormously, but they must supplement each other in certain concrete ways”
(Jacobs, 1961, p.14).
City streets, districts and mix of uses – Jacobs:

• Sidewalks to ensure street safety;

• A city district that fails to ensure street safety makes people fear the streets; and
as they fear them, they use them less, so that streets become even more unsafe;

• Safe streets are streets where passers-by, street level merchants and residents
can keep ‘eyes’ on street

• Buildings need to be orientated in a way so that residents can watch street life;

• Street activities are thus encouraged.

WILLIAM H. WHYTE:

• A pioneer in the study of human behavior in urban settings.

• why some urban plazas were successful as public spaces while others were not.

• “The street is the river of life of the city.”

• They come to these places not to escape but to partake of it.”

• In fact, The relationship between the street and a plaza is another key element to
its success (or failure).

• As a result of this study, Whyte recommended to the Planning Commission that

the zoning regulations limit plazas to no more than three feet above or three feet
below street level to allow for visibility and easy access.

• The study found that tree canopies, water features, sculptures and food
vendors all played a role in attracting people to urban plazas and parks.

• Failed projects included places where streets faced blank walls and were devoid
of shops, windows or doors. For example, Houston, Texas is complete with
streets designed primarily for cars, without much consideration for pedestrian
traffic.

• Reaching a critical mass is also important in attracting people to public spaces.

• Less densely populated cities need to concentrate their public spaces in order to
generate activity.

• The area where the street and plaza or open space meet is key to success or
failure.
• Ideally, the transition should be such that it’s hard to tell where one ends and the
other begins.

• New York’s Paley Park is one of the best examples. The sidewalk in front is an
integral part of the park.

• An arborlike foliage of trees extends over the sidewalk.

• There are urns of flowers and the curb and, on either side of the steps, curved
sitting ledges.

• In this foyer you can usually find somebody waiting for someone else it is a
convenient rendezvous point people sitting on the ledges, and, in the middle of the
entrance, several people in conversation.
 ISSUES OF URBAN SPACE
UNIT-IV

• Understanding and interpreting of urban problems/issues

• Place making and identity

• Urban Morphology, sprawl, generic form, incoherence, privatized

public realm

• Effects/role of real estate, transportation, zoning & globalisation

• Ideas of sustainability, heritage, conservation and renewal

contemporary approaches

• Idea of Urban catalyst, transit metropolis and community participation

 PLACE MAKING
• Place making inspires people to collectively reimaging and reinvent public
spaces as the heart of every community.

• Strengthening the connection between people and the places they share,
placemaking refers to a collaborative process by which we can shape our public
realm in order to maximize shared value.

• More than just promoting better urban design, placemaking facilitates creative
patterns of use, paying particular attention to the physical, cultural, and social
identities that define a place and support its ongoing evolution.

Most great places, whether a grand downtown plaza or humble neighborhood park,
share four key attributes:

1. They are accessible and well connected to other important places in the area.
2. They are comfortable and project a good image.
3. They attract people to participate in activities there.
4. They are sociable environments in which people want to gather and visit.
again and again.

• Place making is a multi-faceted approach to the planning, design and management of

public spaces.

• Place making capitalizes on a local community’s assets, inspiration, and potential,

ultimately creating good public spaces that promote people’s health, happiness, and
wellbeing.

• Place making is both a process and a philosophy

• The concepts behind Place making originated in the 1960s, when writers like Jane Jacobs
and William H. Whyte offered ground-breaking ideas about designing cities that catered to
people, not just to cars and shopping centers.
 • Their work focused on the importance of lively neighbourhoods and inviting public spaces.
Jane Jacobs advocated citizen ownership of streets through the now-famous idea of “eyes on
the street.” William H. Whyte emphasized essential elements for creating social life in
public spaces

Access & Linkages:

• You can easily judge the accessibility of a place by noting its connections to the
surroundings, including the visual links.

• A great public space is easy to get to, easy to enter, and easy to navigate. It is arranged
so that you can see most of what is going on there, both from a distance and up close.

Comfort & Image:

• A space that is comfortable and looks inviting is likely to be successful.

• A sense of comfort includes perceptions about safety, cleanliness, and the availability
of places to sit. A lack of seating is the surprising downfall of many otherwise good
places.
Uses & Activities:
• A range of activities are the fundamental building blocks of a great place.

• A carefully chosen range of activities will help a place attract a variety of people at
different times of the day.

Sociability:
• This is the most important quality for a place to achieve—and the most difficult.

• When a place becomes a favourite spot for people to meet friends, greet their
neighbours, and feel comfortable interacting with strangers, then you are well on your
way to having a great place..

Benefits of place making:

• + Visually pleasing
• + Generally stimulating
• + Sense of belonging
• + Greater security
• + Better environmental quality
• + Feeling of freedom
• +Greater community organization
• + Sense of pride and volunteerism
• + Perpetuation of integrity and values
• + Less need for municipal control+ Self-managing
• More walkable
• + Safe for pedestrians and bicyclists
• + Compatible with public transit
• + Reduces need for cars and parking
• + More efficient use of time and money
• + Greater connections between uses

IDENTITY AND PLACE

• Place identity refers to a cluster of ideas about place and identity in the fields of
geography, urban planning, urban design, landscape architecture, environmental
psychology, and urban sociology/ecological sociology.
• It concerns the meaning and significance of places for their inhabitants and users.

• Methodologies for understanding place identity primarily involve qualitative techniques,

such as interviewing, participant observation, discourse analysis and mapping a
range of physical elements.

• Some urban planners, urban designers and landscape architects use forms of deliberative
planning, design Charette and participatory design with local
• communities as a way of working with place identity to transform existing places as well
as create new ones. This kind of planning and design process is sometimes referred to as
place making.

• Place identity is sometimes called urban character, neighbourhood character or local

character.

• Place identity has become a significant issue in the last 25 years in urban planning and
design.

• Related to the worldwide movement to protect places with heritage significance, concerns
have arisen about the loss of individuality and distinctiveness between different places as
an effect of cultural globalisation.

URBAN MORPHOLOGY

• Urban morphology is the study of the form of human settlements and the process of
their formation and transformation.

• The study seeks to understand the spatial structure and character of a metropolitan
area, city, town or village by examining the patterns of its component parts and the
process of its development.

• This can involve the analysis of physical structures at different scales as well as patterns
of movement, land use, ownership or control and occupation.

• Typically, analysis of physical form focuses on street pattern, lot pattern and building
pattern, sometimes referred to collectively as urban grain.

• Analysis of specific settlements is usually undertaken using cartographic sources and

the process of development is deduced from comparison of historic maps.

• Special attention is given to how the physical form of a city changes over time and to
how different cities compare to each other.

• Another significant part of this subfield deals with the study of the social forms which are
expressed in the physical layout of a city, and, conversely, how physical form produces
or reproduces various social forms.

• The essence of the idea of morphology was initially expressed in the writings of the great
poet and philosopher Goethe (1790); the term as such was first used in bioscience.
 • Recently it is being increasingly used in geography, geology, philology and other
subjects.

• Urban morphology is also considered as the study of urban tissue, or fabric, as a means
of discerning the underlying structure of the built landscape.

• This approach challenges the common perception of unplanned environments as chaotic

or vaguely organic through understanding the structures and processes embedded in
urbanisation.

• The tool for analysing the Urban Morphology has some theories such as Space syntax,
Figure and Ground cities

Three Theories of Urban Spatial Design:

(i) Figure and Ground
(ii) Linkage theory
(iii) Place Theory

URBAN SPRAWL

• Urban sprawl is basically another word for urbanization.

• It refers to the migration of a population from populated towns and cities to low
density residential development over more and more rural land.

• The end result is the spreading of a city and its suburbs over more and more
rural land.

Causes of Urban Sprawl:

o Lower Land Rates:

cost of land and houses in the outer suburbs of the cities is less, because the centers of urban
development have really made people want to stop settling in these areas and want to venture
further out.

o Improved Infrastructure:
There is increased spending on certain types of infrastructures, including roads and
electricity. This is something that hasn’t always been available, and there are still some areas
that don’t have these luxuries.

o Lack of Urban Planning:

 People love to find areas that have less traffic and more calm, which leads them to sprawl out
to other sections of the town. Unprecedented development, cutting of trees, loss of green
cover, long traffic jams, poor infrastructure force people to move out to new areas.

o Lower House Tax Rates:

Cities will usually have high property taxes, and you can usually avoid these taxes by living
in the outer suburbs because the taxes are usually lower than they would be in other
situations.

o Rise in Standard of Living:

There are also increases in standards of living and average family incomes, which means that
people have the ability to pay more to travel and commute longer distances to work and back
home.

• Rise in Population Growth:

Another factor that contributes towards urban sprawl is rise in population growth. As number
of people in a city grows beyond capacity, the local communities continues to spread farther
and farther from city centers.

Consumer Preferences:
• People in high income groups have stronger preferences towards larger homes, more
bedrooms, bigger balconies and bigger lawns.

Effects of Urban Sprawl:

• Environmental Issues: Sprawls can also cause certain environmental issues that you
may want to be aware of. In fact, when you think about going out to develop these lands
you will have to worry about the wildlife that lives in these lands. You will be displacing
them, and it can really cause a ripple in the environment.

• Impact on Social Lives: When people move further out, they also have an impact on
their social lives. They don’t have neighbors that live as close, which means that they
won’t really stay as social as they should

• Will continue to occur as long as we live here on earth. It isn’t something that is going to
change, but over time the more rural areas are going to become more populated because
of development and change.

• It may lead to less overcrowding- but it won’t happen overnight. It’s clear that urban
sprawl is something that people will consider to be a good thing or a bad thing,
depending on their own beliefs systems
 GENERIC FORM & GENERIC CITY

• As the world becomes more globalized and information exchanges are so fast, many
cities in the world are trying to position themselves apart from other cities to attract
different resources such as investment or manpower.

• One of the strategy that city uses is to create its own identity/branding to separate from
others. Rem Koolhaas formulates different ideas how city could position itself better as
“Generic City”. His theory is based on his own critical observations of many global
cities he experiences and what characterizes them.

• First, he despises the identity of the city and believes identity actually choke the city
itself to death. He said “Identity is like a mousetrap in which more and more mice
have to share the original bait,…, The stronger identity, the more it imprisons, the
more it resists expansion, interpretation, renewal, contradiction.”

• Also, “The insistence on the center as the core of value and meaning, font of all
significance, is doubly destructive.” He celebrates and believes generic city is liberated
from “the straightjacket of identity.”

• Second, Koolhaas thinks the airport is the most important elements to understand the
contemporary city. He stresses the architectural and spatial aspects of the airport
could provide as well as the performance and autonomy of the airport could offer. That is
why he called “the airport is the most singular, characteristic elements of the
Generic City” and the airport will replace the city in the future.

• In contrast to the view of current urban planing, he embraces the fact of motorways and
bridges over pedestrians networks that generic city has to offer.

• He affirms that is “the free style” of generic city and the generic city is immoral and
pragmatic. Also, the Generic City grows so fast that city planning becomes redundant.
That is the advantage of the Generic City.

• In architecture of generic city, Koolhaas emphasizes on the use of the postmodern

language as a method, not a historical language. And, He believes generic city employs
this architectural style that does not need a strong theoretical framework helps the
development of the generic city.
 PRIVATIZATIZATION OF PUBLIC REALM

• Public realm or the public sphere is an area in social life where individuals can
come together to freely discuss and identify societal problems, and through that
discussion influence political action.

• It is "a discursive space in which individuals and groups congregate to discuss matters of
mutual interest and, where possible, to reach a common judgment.

• The public sphere can be seen as "a theatre in modern societies in which political
participation is enacted through the medium of talk" and "a realm/domain of social life in
which public opinion can be formed

• Traditionally public spaces were funded with public money and built by the local
government.

• With a commitment to public service and less emphasis on returns on investment, design
decisions could be made for the greater good.

• Lack of Community Cohesion is the primary issue.

• The gated communities produce privatized open space, especially in housing

developments, leads people to become less inclined to spend time in truly urbanized open
spaces, such as city parks.

• The privatized open spaces such as those ones of the public Apartment and
condo building has open space open only for its residents and they can only
access ; which leads to people socializing with people like themselves.

• This will allow us to get to know only our neighbours; it can discourage us from
mingling with people in our local community.
 • When people keep to themselves, social inclusion and community cohesion can
suffer.
• In other words, the privatization of public space is an attempt to diminish the
democratic dreams of ordinary citizens.

URBAN DESIGN TRANSPORTATION

• The combination of urban design and transportation objectives produces urban

environments in which people can live, work, learn, play and recreate; all within a
short walk or a transit ride.
• This is an antidote to the large lots of single-family homes that are a car drive away from
everything, and that have come to characterize urban sprawl. It is also characterised by
the spreading of urban developments (as houses and shopping centers) on undeveloped
land near a city

……UNIT-1 NOTES

ZONING
• Zoning is subject to modification if required to protect the public health ,safety or welfare .

• Legislative bodies make judgement based upon the data.

• The careful analysis is done and decisions are made based on sound planing and the zoning
principles.

• It will lessen congestion on streets, secure greater safety from fire, panic and similar danger
,promote health by requiring adequate light and air

• Prevent overcrowding of land , avoid undue concentrations of population,facilitate the

provision of adequate transportation, water supply , sewage disposal

• Other basic necessities such as schools, parks,play grounds ,civic and clutural amenities
• Blight ,obsolescence and slums are dicouraged the city retains the good character and
appearance .

……UNIT-1 NOTES

GLOBALISATION AND THE URBAN SPACE

McGee and Watters have identified two features of the present version of globalisation —
increased integration of the national economies with the global systems of production,
consumption, and distribution; and space-time contraction that is the effect of technological
advances in transport, communication, and computer technology.

And, cities are the primary spatial framework within which capital, goods, people, and
information are concentrated; therefore, globalisation has influenced urban space formation in
India. However, shaping of spatial structures of Indian cities by global forces has been little
discussed in globalisation debates.

Before the British came, Indian cities were monocentric — located around central market
places (eg, Delhi's Chandini Chowk, Abid/Koti in Hyderabad). To the market centre the British
ad ..

After Independence state housing boards and urban development authorities, to accomplish
certain explicit and defined goals, added contrived centres to Indian cities, which led to the
emergence of government-driven polycentric cities. Market-driven polycentric cities have, in
contrast, developed during the late 1990s and show three spatial patterns — leapfrog
development, fractured cities, and divided cities.
 Revenues generated to meet external demands have provided funds to support production of
locally-consumed goods and services in Indian cities. The market demand for retail products and
housing has led to construction of malls, retail outlets, and apartment complexes, which has
transformed the urban space within the monocentric city.

As a matter of fact, tall buildings, shopping malls, corporate headquarters, prestige hotels, and
hospitals were overlaid on the earlier built environment by a process of creative destruction, for
instance road widening often left buildings unfit fo . for use and developers would purchase a
group of buildings to construct high-rise structures. Consequently, the core city space has
become randomly marked with glass and steel structures as if development has leapfrogged from
one location to another.

At the same time, several economic centres have developed in the periphery leading to
polycentric cities. In the west these nuclei of economic activity are known by various names —
"technoburbs" (Robert Fishman), "urban villages" (Kenneth Jackson) .. "middle landscape"
(Peter Rowe), and "edge cities" (Joel Garreau). In India global capital in search for the cheapest
available land honed-in on the periurban space surrounding cities.

Periurban areas in India are the rural-urban interface and a landing ground for rural residents
migrating to cities. Polynucleation of periurban areas is spatially manifested in the form of
office parks, malls, and apartments and single-family homes.

Moreover, the core and periphery of Indian cities are now separated as if by a fault line and
construction of expressways, ring-roads, bypasses has accentuated the fracture. State
governments, by their excessive reliance on public health inspired zoning based on abstract
pattern of standard streets, lots, and set backs, and commercial strips, have also contributed
to the process of fracturing of Indian cities.

Indian cities have been divided by the desire of different types of people to live s .separately
from other socio-economic groups leading to distance in urban space. This was observed by the
Chicago School in the US and called "spatial polarisation". Divided cities have arisen due to
the "exclusionary aspirations rooted in fear and protection of privilege and the values of civic
responsibility...and the dangers of making outsiders of fellow citizens".

Spatially, this has led to the construction of "gated communities" to wall out uncertainty,
reduce different types of physical risk (e.g. personal safety) and social interactions (eg unwanted
social exchanges). At the same time job creation in cities due to multiplier effects of external
injections has attracted different types of people leading to diverse and plural cities, called
"mongrel cities" by Leonie Sandercock.

How to plan to enrich human life in fractured, divided, and mongrel cities Planning has two
components — the hard component (built environment) and the soft component. In turn,
planning for the built environment is possible at two scales. At the macro-level regional level
planning for transport, water supply, sewage disposal, and environment management is
required. Simultaneously micro-level planning by using tools, such as neo-traditional models,
is a practical possibility to retro-fit neighbourhoods.

In contrast to conventional development, neo-traditional development models aim to recreate

the classic small town with its walkable streets, mix of land uses, and blend of buildings and
open space. Orlando City in Florida has combined neo-traditional planning principles and
public-private partnership frameworks to develop compact and walkable neighborhoods,
villages, and town centres with a jobs/housing balance; and clustered open spaces
occupying more than 40% of the land.

Noteworthy is the integration of principles of architecture, urban design, and planning at the
neighbourhood level and planning looks at the built form (eg footprints of all structures), land
use patterns (eg location and density of retail, office spaces), public open space (eg parks,
plazas), street design (eg circulation systems), and pedestrian access (eg one-quarter mile
access from shops).
 IDEAS OF SUSTAINABILITY

Sustainable design (also called environmental design, environmentally sustainable

design, environmentally conscious design, etc.) is the philosophy of designing physical
objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of social,
economic, and ecological sustainability

Sustainable Urbanism, as a defined term, is application of sustainability and resilient

principles to the design, planning, and administration/operation of cities.

Related to sustainable urbanism is the Ecocity movement (also known as Ecological

Urbanism) which specifically is looking to make cities based on ecological principles,
and the Resilient Cities movement addresses depleting resources by creating
distributed local resources to replace global supply chain in case of major disruption.

Green urbanism is another common term for sustainable urbanism. Sustainable

development is a general term for both making both urban and economic growth more
sustainable, but isn't specifically a mode of urbanism.

Sustainable urbanism aims to close the loop by eliminating environmental impact of urban
development by providing all resources locally.

It looks at the full life cycle of the products to make sure that everything is made sustainably,
and sustainable urbanism also brings things like electricity and food production into the city.

This means that literally everything that the town or city needs is right there making it truly self-
sufficient and sustainable.

The architect and urban planner Doug Farr discusses making cities walkable, along
with combining elements of ecological urbanism, sustainable urban infrastructure, and
new urbanism, and goes beyond them to close the loop on resource use and bring
everything into the city or town.

It is about increasing the quality of life by bringing more resources within a short
distance and also increasing the quality of products that are offered.\
Defining Elements of Sustainable Urbanism

• Compactness
o Compactness, or density, plays an important role in sustainable urban development
because it supports reductions in per-capita resource use and benefits public transit
developments
o For these reasons, sustainable urbanism requires minimum development densities
roughly four times higher than two dwelling units per acre.

• Biophilia
• The concept of Biophilia hypothesis was introduced by E. O. Wilson. It refers to the
connection between humans and other living systems.

• Within this concept, humans are biologically predisposed to caring for nature. In
Douglass Farr’s book, Sustainable Urbanism:

• Urban Design with Nature, he links open spaces such as parks and recreational areas,
sustainable food production and agricultural land use practices with humans’ concern
and relationship with natural systems.

• Therefore, biophilia is a crucial underlying component of sustainable urbanism.

• Sustainable Corridors
• Sustainable corridors are similar to a wildlife corridor in that they connect one area to
another efficiently, cheaply, and safely.

• They allow people to pass from their immediate proximity to another without relying
on cars or other wasteful and inefficient products.

• It also relys on accessibility to all people in the community so that the mode of
transportation is the most convenient and easiest to use for everyone. Sustainable
Corridors also include biodiversity corridors to allow animals to move around
communities so that they may still live in and around cities.

• High Performance Buildings

• High performance buildings are designed and constructed to maximize operational
energy savings and minimize environmental impacts of the construction and
operation of the buildings.

• Building construction and operation generates a great deal of ‘externalized costs’

such as material waste, energy inefficiencies and pollution.
URBAN RENEWAL:

Urban Renewal is a continuous up-gradation process by which large areas of town / city,
gradually change their character by slowly renewing themselves to fit in with the needs of
contemporary society.

A combination of circumstances like

• Expansion of town without proper planning,
• new modes of living or shopping,
• changing attitudes towards environment also lead to such schemes.

Urban Renewal can be said as a collective programme to alter or correct the above stated
troubles.
It includes
• redevelopment,
• conservation and
• rehabilitation.

NEED:
In Urban areas, urban agglomeration and the resulting population congestion leads to unbearable
living conditions, which is the root cause of planning a renewal programme.

The need for urban development mainly arises due to

1. Bad living conditions of urban people
2. Physical and Functional obsolescence.
3. Traffic congestions due to improper planning.
4. Economic/Social imbalance
5. Inadequacy of infrastructural facilities.

AIMS AND GOALS

1. Identification of areas for different schemes i.e., conserrvation, rehabilitation,
redevelopment etc.
2. Provision of required housing, commercial and industrial facilities.
3. Improvement of slums and blighted area
 4. Strengthening and Provision of infrastructual facilities – viz… schools, hospitals etc
and amenities like water supply, drainage
5. Deciding the traffic circulation pattern by strengthening and widening of existing roads
and provision of links.

URBAN RENEWAL STRATIGIES

1. Redevelopment
2. Rehabilitation
3. Clearance
4. Urban Decentralisation
5. Conservation
6. Reproduction
7. Revitalisation

1. REDEVELOPMENT – ( CLEARING AND RE-USE OF LAND)

Redevelopment is taken to mean the process which involves clearance of property and the
building of new structures according to a definite pre-conceived plan with the layout different
from that of area before redevelopment was undertaken.

7. REVITALISATION
Helps to discard negative imagery of a city .
Ex: Old industrial centres are frequently defined in the media by severe economic and
social deprivation, homelessness, high levels of crime, vandalism, public disorder,
pollution and a lack of civic amenities. As a consequence, they have increasingly
needed to reposition themselves as centres of leisure and amenity rather than of
production and heavy industry.

CONTEMPORARY APPROACHES:
COMMUNITY/ PUBLIC PARTICIPATION AND URBAN DESIGN:

Public participation is the involvement of people in the creation and management of their built
and natural environments. Its strength is that it cuts across tradition professional boundaries and
cultures.

The activity of community participation is based on the principle that the built and natural
environments work better if citizens are active and involved in its creation and management
instead of being treated as passive consumers.

The main purposes of participation are; To involve citizens in planning and design decision
making processes and, as a result, make it more likely they will work within established systems
when seeking solutions to problems.

To provide citizens with a voice in planning and decision making in order to improve plans,
decisions, service delivery, and overall quality of the environment.

To promote a sense of community by bringing together people who share common goals.
Participation should be active and directed, those who become involved should experience a
sense of achievement.

Traditional planning procedures should be examined to ensure that participation achieves

more than a simple affirmation of the designers or planners intentions.

The Importance of Participation: The planning system is meant to reflect the general wishes of
the local community and there is a need on the local authority to consult widely during the
formulation of a Local Plan and in the operation of the development.

TRANSIT METROPOLIS:

• A Transit metropolis is an urbanized region with high-quality public transportation

services and settlement patterns that are conducive to riding public transit.

• While Transit villages and Transit-oriented developments (TODs) focus on

creating compact, mixed-use neighbourhoods around rail stations, transit
metropolises represent a regional constellation of TODs that benefit from having
both trip origins and destinations oriented to public transport stations.
 • In an effort to reduce mounting traffic congestion problems and improve
environmental conditions, a number of Chinese mega-cities, including Beijing
and Shenzhen, have embraced the transit metropolis model for guiding urban
growth and public-transport investment decisions.

Types of Transit Metropolises:

Adaptive Cities:

• Transit oriented cities that have invested in rail systems to guide urban
growth and achieve larger societal objectives

• Such as preserving open space, producing affordable housing in rail

served communities

• All feature compact mixed use suburban communities and new towns
concentrated around rail nodes

• Examples: Stockholm, Tokyo, Singapore and Copenhagen

Adaptive Transit:

• places that have accepted spread out low density patterns of growth

• Seek to appropriately adapt transit services and new technologies to these

environments
 • Karlsruhe (dual track systems); Adelaide (track guided buses) and Mexico
City (small vehicle entrepreneurial services)

Strong Core Cities:

• integrating transit and urban development within a more confined central

city context

• Provide integrated tram services around mixed traffic tram and light rail
system

• Trams designed into streetscapes and coexist with pedestrian and bicycle
traffic
• Examples: Zurich and Melbourne

Hybrid:
• Adaptive cities and adaptive transit
• Create workable balance between concentrating development along main line
transit corridors and adapting transit to serve their spread out suburbs and
exurbs

• Munich-heavy rail trunk line services, light rail and conventional bus services
have strengthened central city while also serving suburban growth axes
 BEST PRACTICE IN URBAN DESIGN

UNIT-III

CASE STUDIES
Contemporary case studies from developing and developed economies that offer design
guidelines and solutions to address various issues/ aspects of urban space.
URBAN DESIGN THEORIES:

Accepted current urban design principles:

• It is Council policy to ensure that development is designed to a high qualitative

standard and promotes the creation of good places.

• The Council will apply the guidance set out in the Urban Design Manual – A Best
Practice Guide (2008), and will seek to ensure that development proposals are
cognisant of the need for proper consideration of context, connectivity,
inclusivity, variety, efficiency, distinctiveness, layout, public realm,
adaptability, privacy and amenity, parking, and detailed design.

• Current urban design principles emphasise design criteria summarised well by

Bentley et al (1985) in their design manual “Responsive Environments”. They
suggest qualities such as permeability, legibility, varied or mixed uses and visual
appropriateness are of foremost importance in urban design.
Permeability or accessibility:

• Its refers to the number of choices people have for routes that can be taken to
travel through an area. Both visual and physical permeability is considered
important for well designed areas.

• A successful place is easy to get to and move through. Places should connect
to their surroundings. A successful place gives people the maximum amount of
choice of how to make a journey and takes into account all forms of movement
(foot, cycle, public transport and car).

• Where possible connections should emphasise sustainable forms of transport

over individual car use. A successful place also makes clear connections from
new development areas to existing roads and facilities.

• This will give users more choices of route when making their journeys.
Permeability must be considered early in any planning or development process
because streets are the most permanent element of any built environment

Legibility:
• It is the quality which helps people read and understands where things are in an
area. In traditional cities, the biggest buildings were the most important buildings
and had the biggest spaces reserved around them.
• It was easy to distinguish the major public buildings from the less relevant private
buildings. In modern cities, there is often little difference between important
public facilities such as public administration buildings and even railway stations,
from private office buildings.
• A successful and ‘legible’ development is a place that has a clear image and is
easy to understand. Five features, which create this kind of place, have been
identified:

• Paths – the routes of movement such as alleys, streets and railways

• Nodes – focal places such as market squares which connect the paths and
roads.

• Landmarks – buildings or places that provide local character and act as

reference points.
• Districts – areas of the County with distinct or recognisable characteristics
such as the business district.
 • Edges – linear elements not used as routes like busy roads, walls of buildings
and railway lines.

Vitality:
• Places that are vibrant, active, safe, comfortable and varied are said to have
vitality. Places are more active when they have windows and doors connected to
the street. Inactive edges are blank walls, badly placed entrances, tunnels,
places where you don’t feel safe, which are not overlooked.
• Places feel safer with buildings overlooking them.

Variety/Diversity:
• A successful place also offers a mix of activities to the widest range of possible
users.
• The most connected streets usually have a wider variety of uses because they
are easier to get to and more people go there.
• Variety is desirable because it provides a choice of activities for a wider range of
people, things to do and places to go, making the place more exciting.
• In commercial areas, a variety of uses will also attract larger numbers of
consumers to the area and therefore make it more economically successful.
• It is important to get the right mix of uses. A successful mix is achieved when
uses create a balanced community with a range of services without increasing
the need for the car.
• The most prominent sites are no longer reserved for the most important
public buildings, but are awarded to the highest bidder. Skyscrapers
dominate the landscape and look the same regardless of whether they are
publicly relevant buildings or office buildings owned by either private or
institutional interests.

Robustness:
• This refers to a place’s ability to be used for many different purposes by
different people, or its potential for change and adaptation for different uses
over time.

• A robust place, whether outdoors or indoors, has many possible uses. A robust
building’s function can change over time.

• The whole building can take on a new use, or function, an industrial warehouse,
for example, can become new office space. Or a small space within a building
can change use, such as a garage into a sitting room.
 • A robust place takes advantage of climatic conditions such as daylight,
sunlight and wind, by, for example, placing solar panels on south facing
buildings.

Road Layout ‘Shared Spaces’:

• One of the legacies of residential layout design in the recent past has been that
design considerations have often been dominated by provision for motor
vehicles.
• A key challenge of urban design is to successfully promote the other functions of
streets including providing a ‘sense of place’, facilitating social interaction and
encouraging walking and cycling.
• Road alignments should discourage speed and give priority to the safety and
convenience of pedestrians and cyclists.
• Road widths in general should be sufficient to accommodate two vehicles
passing, but not so generous as to encourage speeding or excessive on-
street/kerbside parking.
• The concept is essentially traffic calming interweaved with urban design in
residential and town/ village areas, so that cars do not dominate in terms of street
use and are required to manoeuvre at lower speeds.
• In terms of translating these concepts into a design methodology, the ‘Urban
Design Manual - A Best Practice Guide’ sets out 12 criteria to cover the range of
design considerations for residential development. The criteria are subdivided
into three groups reflecting the sequence of the design process:

Neighbourhood:
1. Context: How does the development respond to its surroundings?
2. Connections: How well connected is the new neighbourhood?
3. Inclusivity: How easily can people use and access the development? 4. Variety: How
does the development promote a good mix of activities?

Site:
1. Efficiency: How does the development make appropriate use of resources, including
land?
2. Distinctiveness: How do the proposals create a sense of place?
3. Layout: How does the proposal create people friendly streets and spaces?
4. Public Realm: How safe, secure and enjoyable are the public areas?
Home:
1. Adaptability: How will the buildings cope with change?
2. Privacy and Amenity: How does the scheme provide a decent standard of amenity?
3. Parking: How will the parking be secure and attractive?
4. Detailed Design: How well thought through is the building and landscape design?

CASE STUDIES:
Garden city:
• The garden city movement is a method of urban planning that was initiated in
1898 by Sir Ebenezer Howard in the United Kingdom. Garden cities were
intended to be planned, self-contained communities surrounded by "greenbelts",
containing proportionate areas of residences, industry, and agriculture.
 • His idealised garden city would house 32,000 people on a site of 6,000 acres
(2,400 ha), planned on a concentric pattern with open spaces, public parks
and six radial boulevards, 120 ft (37 m) wide, extending from the centre
• The garden city would be self-sufficient and when it reached full population,
another garden city would be developed nearby. Howard envisaged a cluster of
several garden cities as satellites of a central city of 250,000 people, linked by
road and rail.
• “three magnets”
-town (high wages, opportunity, and amusement)
-country (natural beauty, low rents, fresh air)
-town-country (combination of both)
-separated from central city by greenbelt
• Ebenezer Howard recognised that a Garden City should be carefully designed in
relation to the site it occupies, and he gave an indication of how a cluster of
towns (Garden Cities) would operate.
• Howard set out a vision for a Garden City that would reach an ideal population of
around 32,000 people Once this planned limit had been reached, a new city
would be started a short distance away, followed by another, and another, until a
network of such places was created, with each city providing a range of jobs and
services, but each connected to the others via a rapid transport system, providing
all the benefits of a much larger city but with each resident having easy access to
the countryside.
• Howard called this network of connected settlements the ‘Social City’

UTOPIAN MODEL:
• Contemporary City- Le Corbusier is considered one of the utopias which have
been partially realized.
 • He compared the medieval town planning in Europe to “Pack Donkey way” ,
the meandering streets, high density low rise built fabric, the squares and plazas
were a limiting factor to further growth of cities in Europe according to Le
Corbusier.

• He saw death as the only solution to the cities which were full of “capillaries”
and no “arteries.

• an ideal, self-contained community of predetermined area and population

surrounded by a greenbelt

• was intended to bring together the economic and cultural advantages of both
city and country life while at the same time discouraging metropolitan sprawl
and industrial centralization

• land ownership would be vested in the community (socialist element)

• The garden city was foreshadowed in the writings of Robert Owen, Charles
Fourier, and James Silk Buckingham, and in the planned industrial communities
of Saltaire (1851), Bournville (1879), and Port Sunlight (1887) in England

• Howard organized the Garden-City Association (1899) in England and secured

backing for the establishment of Letchworth and Welwyn

• Neither community was an entirely self-contained garden city

Fundamental Principles:
• The site should be level, this would aid smooth traffic Flow

• River should be away from the city.

 • Population would consist of ; City Dwellers, Suburban Dwellers and Garden
City Dwellers.

• Increase the density at the center of the city.

• Increase the open spaces and reduce the travel time, hence construct vertically.

• The transport and service lines shall not be buried beneath the road but
exposed.

• Three sets of roads should be constructed: One for heavy traffic at the ground or
one level below, ground level traffic should access all ground floors of buildings,
and the major arterial roads are at a higher level crisscrossing the city.

• There would be only one station, in the center of the city, this would be a hub for
multi modal public transport.

• The city would consist of 24 sky scrapers housing 50,000 employees, this would
be the center of the city.

• Corridor Streets, with abutting internal court houses should be completely

banned.

• Residential block shall be divided into two sections; large vertical blocks and
garden cities away from city. The garden cities are accessible through rapid
transit metro lines.

• Population Density; Business District = 1200 per acre, Residence 1= 120 per
acre and Residence 2 = 120 per acre
• Open space; BD= 95 %, RD1= 85% and RD 2= 48%.
• Industrial zone should be away from the entire city. Educational and other civic
amenities should be one corner.
• Geometry, standardization and mechanization should be the governing frame
work .

Derivations
• The vertical neighborhoods, not in the center but at the periphery
• Central business districts with sky scrapers.
 • Suburbs with subsidized housing which are typical in form and geometry. These
suburbs connected by rapid transit system.
• Planning of Chandigarh, Brasilia and other smaller capitals

WALKING CITY BY RON HERRON:

The city was supposed to be self propelling and change location as the need be the
city would be divided functionally among the many mega capsules with connecting
tubes, the entire structure would “walk”. The city could “walk” on water.

Plug In City:

• The city consisted of large support structures which could support individual
plug in dwelling components.

• Cranes would be mounted at the apex of support towers to lift and place the
modules in place. Hover crafts with elaborate built structures (which are
essential self functioning barges) would move from place to place.

Cities in Buildings:

Number of theoretical proposals has been postulated to the house considerable number
of people within a building, with work-home-recreation built at various levels. Although
none of the schemes have been implemented, the offshoot of such theory has been the
multi use skyscrapers prevalent in number of cities.

Cities of Sweat Equity:

Cities which are built by people; by squatting, by cooperation, by community action

or as a result of a common belief, are called as cities of sweat equity.

• Cities of sweat equity have taken many forms;

• Squatter settlements which were a small part of the city became autonomous
self governed entities.

• Small self help communities based on the concepts of sustainable present and
future.

• The cities of sweat equity grow on the need based affordability of its inhabitants.

• They are normally a collection of smaller groups of settlements which reflect the
cultural roots of the group. Advocacy Planning, Community Architecture,
and Citizen Participation have been the result of early cities of sweat equity.