URBAN DESIGN THEORY

REFERENCE CONTENT

OUTLINE
To introduce theoretical aspects of Urban Design
To understand the changing attitude toward Urban form/Space and Architecture
To familiarise Urban Design theory through traditional and contemporary examples

SEMESTER 07
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
CITY
City is a collective of people settled at a geographical location and have a focused
method of development. A city grows, expands, emulates energy and also provides for
opportunities for various activities to take place.
Each City has a symbol of association to its people and also people have a factor of
attachment towards their city. It is a positive and optimistic outcome of hope and
aspirations of many people coming together to build it and envision it to be a destination
of their choice or interest.

URBAN
For the Census of India 2011, the definition of urban area is as follows;
All places with a municipality, corporation, cantonment board or notified town area
committee, etc.
All other places which satisfied the following criteria:
1. A minimum population of 5,000;
2. At least 75 per cent of the male main working population engaged in non-agricultural
pursuits; and also engaged in vocational training methods.
3. A density of population of at least 400 persons per sq. km.
The first category of urban units is known as Statutory Towns. These towns are notified under
law by the concerned State/Union Territory (UT) Government and have local bodies like
municipal corporations, municipalities, etc., irrespective of their demographic characteristics
as reckoned on 31st December 2009.
Examples: Vadodara (M Corp.), Shimla (MCorp.) etc.
The second category of Towns (as in item 2 above) is known as Census Town. These were
identified on the basis of previous census data (for 2011 census 2001 census data would be
used)

Urbanization:
The increase over time of the proportion of the total human population that is urban as opposed to
rural. The predominant occupation of the working population is regarded as industrial or
white collar as defined in the Town and country planning Act

Neighbourhood:
Neighbourhood is generally defined spatially as a specific geographic area and functionally
as a set of social networks.
Neighbourhoods, then, are the spatial units in which face-to-face social interactions occur—
the personal settings and situations where residents seek to realize common values socialize
youth, and maintain effective social control."
The scale factor and size is associated with every neighborhood. Here access and
walkability to all basic amenities decides the success of a neighborhood.
Cadastral map:
A cadastral map is a map that shows the boundaries and ownership of land parcels. Some
cadastral maps show additional details, such as survey district names, unique identifying
numbers for parcels, certificate of title numbers, positions of existing structures, section or lot
numbers and their respective
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
areas, adjoining and adjacent street names, selected boundary dimensions and references to prior
maps

Cadastral Plan showing boundaries of land ownership

Block:
A city block, urban block or simply block is a central element of urban planning and urban design. A
city block is the smallest area that is surrounded by streets. City blocks are the space for buildings
within the street pattern of a city, and form the basic unit of a city's urban fabric.
City blocks may be subdivided into any number of smaller land lots usually in private ownership,
though in some cases, it may be other forms of tenure. City blocks are usually built-up to varying
degrees and thus form the physical containers or 'street walls' of public space. Most cities are
composed of a greater or lesser variety of sizes and shapes of urban block

Diagram of an example of a rectangular city block as seen from above, surrounded by streets. The
block is divided into lots which were numbered by the developer as shown in red here and as shown
in plats. The addresses on this example 800 block are shown in black and the adjacent blocks are the
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
700 and 900 blocks. An alley shown in light gray runs lengthwise down the middle of the block. Streets
are shown in dark gray. Sidewalks are shown in light gray. Avenues are shown in green
with walkways shown in light gray from every lot to the street.

Any urban block is judged upon its permeability and also the quality of boundary or edges it
possesses. Any gated development is often confused with the block but an Urban Block exhibits a
character of its own and also possesses a quality of space; which is constant throughout.

The Development in the middle of the city has not evident physical barriers but it exhibits a constant character very distinct
from the rest of the urban fabric

Street:
A Street is a public thoroughfare (usually paved) in a built environment. It is a public parcel of land
adjoining buildings in an urban context, on which people may freely assemble, interact, and move
about. A Street can be as simple as a level patch of dirt, but is more often paved with a hard,
durable surface such as concrete, cobblestone or brick. Portions may also be smoothed with
asphalt, embedded with rails, or otherwise prepared to accommodate non-pedestrian traffic.
But city residents and urban planners draw a crucial modern distinction: a road's main function is
transportation, while streets facilitate public interaction
The factor which let us identify any street in its innate character are plenty but a few important
characters are
Scale, Porosity, View (Vista), Building frontages, system of street grids or its geometry , intersections
and nodes, shading devices , clarity and legibility.

Scale of the street

Strong geometry of street

URBAN DESIGN THEORY

Legibility factor on the street

Overlapping elements on the street front and how it affects reading

the elements on a street

MORPHOLOGY:

The study of the forms of things, a particular form, shape, or structure.

Urban morphology is the study of the form of human settlements and their formation &
transformation.
Urban form is the study of the physical characteristics of towns/cities resulting from an evolutionary
process of urban activities and planning action.
Human settlements is the totality of the human community whether city, town, or settlements village
with all the social, material, organizational spiritual and cultural element that sustain it.
Urban fabric The physical aspect of urbanism, emphasizing building types, thoroughfares, open
space, frontages, and streetscapes but excluding environmental, functional, economic and socio-
cultural aspects Urban structure it's the physical complexity of various scale, from individual building,
plots, street-blocks, and the street pattern.
Urban texture the geometrical structure formed by the spatial distribution of urban elements
expressed as coarse or fine.
URBAN DESIGN THEORY

COARSE GRAIN FINE GRAIN

http://rethinkurban.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/urban-form_layout2-e2.jpg
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
What is Urban Design

Urban + Design
Urban encompasses the city, town, village or hamlet
Design is about effective problem solving and/or the process of delivering or organizing
development as well as narrow aesthetics or particular physical outcomes
Two broad traditions of Urban Design
 The visual Artistic tradition
 The social usage tradition

The visual Artistic tradition The social usage tradition

Reflects an earlier narrower understanding of
urban design. Predominantly product oriented, it
tended to concentrate on the visual qualities
and aesthetic experience of urban spaces rather
than the myriad cultural social economic political
and spatial factors.
Key proponents
Camillo sitte, Gorden Cullen Le corbusier etc
Encompasses the issues of perception and sense
of place. People perceptions and mental images
are given importance. The socio-functional
aspects of the streets and other public spaces.
Key proponents
Kevin Lynch. Jane Jacob, Jan Ghel, William
Whyte, Christopher Alexander etc

The dimensions of Urban design

 The morphological dimension
 The perceptual dimension
 The social dimension
 The visual Dimension
 The functional dimension
 The temporal dimension
URBAN DESIGN THEORY

Module 1
Behavioural /Perceptual approach: City as visual experience– walking, observing,
documenting/recording and interpreting city/ and its elements –such as neighborhood, street, block,
building, architectural elements.

Perceptual Dimension:
We affect the environment and are in turn affected by it. For this to happen we must perceive, that
is, be stimulated by sight, sound, smell and tactile information which offers clues about the world
around us. Perception involves gathering organizing and making sense of information about the
environment. The four most valuable senses in interpreting and sensing the environment are vision,
hearing, smell and touch.
There are four types or dimensions of perception.
 Cognitive: involves thinking about, organizing and keeping of information about the
environment, in essence it enables us to make sense of the environment.
 Affective: involves our feelings which in turn affect our perception of the environment and vice
versa.
 Interpretive: encompasses the meaning and the associations derived from the environment.
 Evaluative: incorporates values and preferences and the determinants of good and bad
elements in the environment
 Perception is not just biological process it is also socially and culturally learnt. While sensations
may be same for everyone , individuals filter, organize, react to and value those sensations
differently.
 Differences in environmental perception can be attributed to a number of factors like age,
gender, ethnicity, lifestyle, length of residence in an area, and also to the physical, social and
cultural environments in which we lived and were raised in.
 Mental maps and images of places and environments, particularly shared or common images
are therefore a central part of studies of environmental perception.

The interaction between observer, and environment leads to cognitive map.

Kevin Lynch:
Kevin Andrew Lynch (January 7, 1918 – April 25, 1984) was an American urban planner and author.
He is known for his work on the perceptual form of urban environments and was an early proponent
of mental mapping. His most influential books include The Image of the City (1960), a seminal work on
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
the perceptual form of urban environments, and What Time is This Place? (1972), which theorizes how
the physical environment captures and refigures temporal processes.
Lynch provided seminal contributions to the field of city planning through empirical research on how
individuals perceive and navigate the urban landscape. His books explore the presence of time and
history in the urban environment, how urban environments affect children, and how to harness
human perception of the physical form of cities and regions as the conceptual basis for good urban
design.
Place images :
For Kevin Lynch environmental images were the result of two way processes through which personal
experiences and values filter the barrage of environment stimuli.
Places thus rarely have a single place identity and instead there are multiple possibly divergent place
identities.
To make sense of their surroundings people reduce reality to a few selective impressions, that is , they
produce place images. Such images are partial simplified idiosyncratic and distorted.
Image is a combination of a place identity and how the place is perceived by the individual.
Imageability according to Lynch is the likelihood of a place to create a strong image in the mind of
the beholder.
He argued that the ease with which we could mentally organize the environment into a cohesive
pattern or image was related to our ability to navigate through it - a quality that he referred to as
legibility
Based on his studies he argued that workable environmental images required three attributes.

Identity: ― Identity is the characteristic that allow us to differentiate one space from another‖. Place
identity is closely linked to personal identity,―
Structure: It is how the object is placed in the space considering its relation to the observer and to
other objects, as the object is not seen isolated from surroundings but as a part of all environmental
components
The Meaning: Meaning is that which the place stands for or represent (Lawson, 2001). It is a hidden
character of the object and the deeper sense that reflects
The importance of the object, this sense may be practical or emotional.

Congruence: It is the relationship of the form to its function. In other words, how is the environmental
structure congruent with non-spatial structure.
Transparency (Immediacy): It stands for the degree of visibility of process occurring in the place to
users.
In other words, it is the degree to which one can actually see what's going.
Legibility: It is the term that has been used for a long time in urban planning defined as ―the ease
with which its parts can be recognized and organized into a coherent pattern‖
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
According to Lynch definition, legibility can enhance the identity, structure and the meaning of
environmental surroundings. The city may have strong identity and character but still confusing and
unclear because of confusion of its path system. This led Lynch to the concept of imageability and
the identification of the city elements
 Paths: these are channels along which observers move streets walkways transit lines canals
etc. Lynch noted that paths were often the predominant elements in peoples images with
other images arranged and related along paths. When major paths lacks identity or were
easily confused with each other the whole image would be less clear

 Edges: these are linear elements either not used or considered by observers as paths and
often form boundaries between areas or linear breaks in continuity. Edges may be barriers
more or less penetrable which close one region off from another or they may be seam lines ,
lines along which the regions are related and joined together.
URBAN DESIGN THEORY

 Nodes: These are point references. The strategic spots in a city into which an observer can
enter and which are the intensive foci to and from which he/she is travelling. Nodes may be
primarily junctions or simply thematic concentrations of a particular use or physical character
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
 Landmarks: these are other types of point references which in contrast to nodes are external
to the observer. Some landmarks towers spires hills are distant and are typically seen from
many angles and from distances over the tops of smaller elements. Other landmarks sculpture
signs tree are primarily local being visible only in restricted localities and from certain
approaches. Characteristics of a land mark is its singularity some aspect that is unique or
memorable in the context.

 Districts: these are medium to large areas that observers enter inside of and /or have common
identifying character. Some districts may have hard or precise boundaries while others may
have soft or uncertain boundaries.
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
Identity and structure are the formal components which help us to perceive and organize both of
space and time in them, while congruence, transparency and legibility are the informal ones which
create interaction between environment and other sides of our lives

The Visual Dimension

The urban environments visual aesthetic character derives from the combination of its spatial
(volumetric) and visual qualities the artifacts in those spaces and the relationship between them all.
Aesthetic appreciation of the urban environment is primarily visual and kinaesthetic (through
movement) nonetheless it is multi sensory hearing, smelling and tactility can be more important than
vision.
Visual aesthetic appreciation of urban environments is a product of perception and cognition and
that is what stimuli we perceive and how we interpret, judge and feel about the information
gathered.
The urban environment is not experienced as a static composition and the kinaesthetic experience
of moving through space over time is an important part of the urban visual aesthetic dimension.
Urban environments are thus experienced in some form of dynamic emerging, unfolding and
temporal sequence.
To describe the visual experience of Townscape, Gordon Cullen conceived the concept of Serial
vision
Cullen argued that the environment is experienced in a series of jerks or revelations.
Delight and interest are stimulated by contrasts and by concealment and revelation; a city view is
first glimpsed then hidden and later revealed again from a new angle or highlighting an interesting
detail. The process of denial and reward is a means of enriching the passage through the built
environment.
Cullen therefore argued that the urban environment should be considered and designed from the
point of view of the moving person.
New modes of travel have provided us with additional ways of engaging with and forming mental
images of the urban environment.
Drivers see the urban environment at a speed and through the windscreen while concentrating on
the road and other traffic, passengers have a greater scope to observe the environment than the
drivers
By contrast the pedestrians or cyclists both see the urban environment differently and have more
freedom to stop and engage in it.
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
Gordon Cullen (1914-1994) was an English architect and Urban designer (empiricist/urbanist) in the
post war period.
He is the author of Townscape later republished as The Concise Townscape a very influential book of
theory of urban design.
According to Gordon Cullen the starting point of any design is the individual’s experience of the
environment and cities should be designed from the view point of the moving person
The goal was to manipulate groups of buildings and physical town elements so as to achieve visual
impact and drama.
The concepts he came up with to support this are
 Concerning place or the art of relationship (reaction to the position of our body in its
environment)
 Concerning optics or Serial Vision(using the faculty of sight)
 Concerning Content
Concerning place
Its purpose is 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.
In essence this talks of the relationship of the physical and visual elements.
The aim is not to dictate the shape of the town but one simply to manipulate within the tolerances

Whenever we create an enclosure immediately the surrounding space is also altered. It is through this
manipulation of two spatial concepts that a large part of urban drama arises.
No sooner do we create a here than automatically we must create a there. Some of the greatest
townscape effects are created by the skillful relationship between the two

Although the pedestrian walks at a uniform speed through the town, the scenery of the town is often
revealed in a series of jerks or revelations. A constant play off between existing views and emerging
views.

Gordon Cullen get famous by the Concise Townscape Theory. The ―Townscape‖ book, one of
Gordon Cullen‘s masterpiece, illustrated with over 300 works selected from the drawings Gordon
Cullen made during his lifetime, this anthology documents his influential career as an Urban Theorist,
artist and illustrator from 1930 to 1990. The majority of his drawings have never been published before
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
except in professional reports, and this book contains numerous drawings executed for the pleasure
of observation as well as the product of his many consultancies.

Serial Vision Serial Vision is to walk from one end of the plan to another, at a uniform pace, will
provide a sequence of revelations which are suggested in the serial drawings opposite, reading from
left to right.

Place Place description is in a world of black and white the roads are for movement and the
buildings for social and business purposes.

Content Content concerned with the intrinsic quality of the various

subdivisions of the environment, and start with the great landscape
categories of metropolis, town, arcadia, park, industrial, arable and wild
nature.

Focal Point Focal point is the idea of the town as a place of assembly, of
social intercourse, of meeting, was taken for granted throughout the
whole of human civilization up to the twentieth century.

Closure Closure, may be differentiated from Enclosure, by contrasting

‗travel‘ with ‗arrival‘. Closure is the cutting up of the linear town system
(streets, passages, etc.) into visually digestible and coherent amounts
whilst retaining the sense of progression. Enclosure on the other hand
provides a complete private world which is inward looking, static and self-
sufficient.

Street Lighting Here we are concerned with the impact of a modern

public lighting installation on towns and not, primarily, with the design of
fittings. Naturally it is impossible to disassociate the two since, as in all townscape, we are concerned
with two aspects: first, intrinsic design and second, the relationship or putting together of things
designed.

Outdoor Publicity One contribution to modern townscape, startlingly conspicuous everywhere you
look, but almost entirely ignored by the town planner, is street outdoor publicity. This is the most
characteristic, and, potentially, the most valuable, contribution of the twentieth century to urban
scenery. At night it has created a new landscape of a kind never before seen in history.

Here and There The practical result of so articulating the town into identifiable parts is that no sooner
do we create a HERE than we have to admit a THERE, and it is precisely in the manipulation of these
two spatial concepts that a large part of urban drama arises.

Man-made enclosure, if only of the simplest kind, divides the environment into HERE and THERE. On
this side of the arch, in Ludlow, we are in the present, uncomplicated and direct world, our world. The
other side is different, having in some small way a life of its own (a with-holding).

City as visual experience– walking, observing,

URBAN DESIGN THEORY
documenting/recording and interpreting city/ and its elements –such as neighborhood, street, block,
building, architectural elements.

Visual Elements of Space:

Urban Architecture:
Street pattern and block and plot sizes: Respect for existing street pattern and block / plots sizes
Siting: siting concerns how a building sits on its site and relates to other buildings and to the street or
other urban spaces.
Size/ massing: the three dimensional disposition of the building volume. It is the literal dimensions of
the object and its placement in the plot.
Building scale: relative to the human and the setting (generic scale) building scale refers to the size
of the adjacent buildings.
Proportions and relationship: the rhythm of solid to void along the street.
Relative visual scale: new buildings should have complimentary proportions with the neigbhouring
buildings
Articulation and richness:
Facades can be appreciated in terms of their visual richness and elegance.
Richness relates to the visual interest and complexity that holds the eye. Elegance is a function of the
proportion that the eye finds pleasing and harmonious.
Detail and visual interest tend to humanize environments
Pattern and rhyme: Some streets are unified through repetition of a particular style while others exhibit
great variety and are yet unified by a common underlying design pattern or motif. Unifying elements
may be present in the form of building silhouettes consistent plot widths fenestration patterns
proportions massing treatment of entrances materials details scale style etc.
Rhythm: Rhythm is the arrangement and size of the constituent parts of a building facade which are
normally repeated. Of particular interest is the solid void ratio. Integrating a large facade into a street
can be done by breaking up the facade into a series of bays
Horizontality and verticality
Materials: Materials can help establish local distinctiveness. Consistent use of local building material
or a limited palette of colours can give a town or a city a strong sense of place

Social and functional characters

Human scale: The height of a building is not necessarily significant in achieving human scale the
articulation of the facade and the visual interest at the pedestrian level is.

Source: Public Places and Urban Spaces, the dimensions of Urban design, Matthew Carmona et all, Routledge
Many traditional urban facades are organized into three elements typically base middle and top.
The base is usually designed to express its structural support relates to the street and is often more
richly decorated as this is the part pedestrians are better able to relate to. The middle is more
restrained while the top is again more visually complex to detain the eye.
URBAN DESIGN THEORY
Active frontages: How buildings address the street is a key determinant
of the quality of streets and of public spaces. Active frontages have a
strong sense of human presence.
Iconography and visual cues to functionality: visual cues are required
to aid the buildings functionality. A well developed iconography (the
visual images and symbols used) and symbolism relating to entrances
and transition spaces between the public and private spaces with
gradations and distinctions defining different degrees of publicness is
essential for a good public frontage.
Floorscape: Well designed floorscape can enhance character of
space, reinforce a sense of scale, unify the space by linking and
relating the edge and /or bring order to a space that would otherwise
be a disparate group of buildings.

https://in.pinterest.com/pin/362117626265786004/
Street furniture: The quality, organization and distribution of street furniture is a prime indicator of the
quality of an urban space. Positioning street furniture to help create and delineate space without
impeding pedestrian or vehicular traffic.
Landscape and landscaping: for landscaping the factors to consider are appearance suitability ease
of maintenance, anti clutter, pedestrian and vehicular friendly

Documenting/recording:
Ways of documenting recording include
Mental mapping as popularized by Kevin Lynch
Mapping/ documenting existing land use/ built form/ street elements etc
Photographs, satellite imagery, land use/ land survey/ cadastral maps
URBAN DESIGN THEORY

Example of ONE Morphology Mapping and executing Gordon Cullen‘s idea of Serial Vision
exercise on an urban environment.
1. Tales of Three Cities (ARC61003 / ARC3113) Mapping The Townscape Kuala Lumpur
Kuala Lumpur is the national capital of Malaysia as well as its largest city, and its
surrounding urban areas form the most industrialized and economically region. It is
the fastest growing regionin Malaysia. Kuala Lumpur attracts a lot of tourists with its
tourist spots such as the Dataran Merdeka, Petronas Twin Towers and KL Tower.
Kuala Lumpur Introduction Kuala Lumpur 3
2. 4. Tales of Three Cities (ARC61003 / ARC3113)
3. Mapping The Townscape Central Market
4. Central Market is a tourist hotspot which is located a distance away from the Petaling
Street. It is a heritage building which was built in 1988 with art deco design. The
Central Market is full of stalls which sell locally made handicrafts that showcase the
cultural items of Malaysia. The Kasturi Walk is a remarkable attraction with a Wau
sculpture located just beside the Central Market. It has a lot of stalls selling food and
souvenirs just like in Petaling Street.
5. Introduction Petaling Street and Central Market Petaling Street Petaling Street is
known as the Chinatown with a lot of food stalls such as asam laksa, hokkien mee
and other local foods and stalls with souvenirs. There are a lot of budget hotels
located at Petaling Street to provide accommodation to tourists.
URBAN DESIGN THEORY

MODULE 1
Sub Topic : Form of a city through the elements as proposed by Kevin Lynch

According to Kevin Lynch the form of a city must be somewhat noncommittal, plastic to the purposes and
perceptions of its citizens. While there are fundamental functions of which the city forms may be
expressive: circulation, major land-uses, and key focal points etc if the environment is visibly organized
and sharply identified, then the citizen can inform it with his own meanings and connections. Then it will
become a true place, remarkable and unmistakable.

Form qualities can be summarized as having: singularity, form simplicity, continuity, dominance, clarity of
joint, directional differentiation, visual scope, motion awareness, time series, and names and meanings

1. Singularity or figure-background clarity:

1. sharpness of boundary (as an abrupt cessation of city development);

2. closure (as an enclosed square);
3. contrast of surface,
4. form,
5. intensity,
6. complexity,
7. size,
8. use,
9. Spatial location (as a single tower, a rich decoration, a glaring sign).
The contrast may be to the immediate visible surroundings, or to the observer's experience.
These are the qualities that identify an element, make it remarkable, noticeable, vivid, and
recognizable. Observers, as their familiarity increases, seem to depend less and less on gross physical
continuities to organize the whole and to delight more and more in contrast and uniqueness which
vivify the scene.

2. Form Simplicity:

Clarity and simplicity of visible form in the geometrical sense,

Limitation of parts as the clarity of a grid system,
a rectangle, a dome.
Forms of this nature are much more easily incorporated in the image, and there is evidence that
observers will distort complex facts to simple forms, even at some perceptual and practical cost.
When an element is not simultaneously visible as a whole, its shape may be a topological distortion o
f a simple form and yet be quite understandable.

3. Continuity:
URoBnA
C nuTa
tiN HnEc
OeRY
of edge or surface (as in a street channel, skyline, or setback)
Nearness of part s (as a cluster of buildings);
repetition of rhythmic interval (a s a street-corner pattern) ; similarity, analogy, or harmony of surface,
form, or use (as in a common building material , repetitive pattern of bay windows, similarity of
market activity, use of common signs). These are the qualities that facilitate the perception of a
complex physical reality as one or as interrelated, the qualities which suggest the bestowing of single
identity.

4. Dominance:

Dominance of one part over others by means o f size, intensity, or interest, resulting in the reading of
the whole as a principal feature with an associated cluster (as in the "Harvard Square area"). This
quality, like continuity, allows the necessary simplification of the image by omission and
subsumption. Physical characteristics, to the extent that they are over the threshold of attention at all,
seem to radiate their image conceptually to some degree, spreading out from a center.

5. Clarity of Joint:

High visibility of joints and seam s (as at a major intersection, or on a sea-front); clear relation and
interconnection (as of a building to it s site, or of a subway station to the street above). These joints
are the strategic moment s of structure and should be highly perceptible.

6. Directional Differentiation:

Asymmetries, gradients, and radial reference s which differentiate one end from another (as on a
path going uphill, away from the sea, and toward the center); or on e side from another (as with
building s fronting a park) ; or one compass direction from another (as by the sun - light, or by the
width of north-south avenues) . These qualities are heavily used in structuring on the larger scale.

7. Visual Scope:

Qualities which increase the range and penetration of vision, either actually or symbolically.
These include transparencies (as with glass or buildings on stilts);
Overlaps (as when structures appear behind others) ;
Vista s and panoramas which increase the depth of vision (as on axial streets, broad open spaces,
high views) ;
Articulating elements (foci, measuring rods, and penetrating objects) which visually explain a space;
concavity (as of a background hill or curving street) which exposes farther objects to view;
URluBeAsNwThHic
C EO
hRspYeak of an element other - wise i2n0v1is9ible (as the sight of activity which is characteristics of
a region to come, or the use of characteristic detail to hint at the proximity of another element). Al l
these related qualities facilitate the grasping of a vast and complex whole by increasing, as it were,
the efficiency of vision: it s range, penetration, and resolving power.

8. Motion Awareness:

The qualities which make sensible to the observer, through both the visual and the kinesthetic senses,
hi s own actual or potential motion. Such are the devices which improve the clarity of slopes, curves,
and interpenetrations; give the experience of motion parallax and perspective ; maintain the
consistency of direction or direction change ; or make visible the distance interval . Since a city is
sensed in motion, these qualities are fundamental , and they are used to structure and eve n t o
identify , wherever they are coherent enough t o make it possible (as : "go left , then right", "at the
sharp bend, " or "three block s along this street") . These qualities reinforce and develop what an
observer can do to interpret direction or distance, and to sense form in motion itself. With increasing
speed, these techniques will need further development in the modern city.

9. Time Series:

Series which are sensed over time, including both simple item-by-item linkages, where one element is
simply knitted to the two elements before and behind it (as in a casual sequence of detailed
landmarks), and also series which are truly structure d in time and thus melodic in nature (as if the
landmark s would increase in intensity of form until a climax point were reached).
The former (simple sequence) is very commonly used, particularly along familiar paths. Its melodic
counterpart is more rarely seen, but may be most important to develop in the large, dynamic,
modern metropolis. Here what would be imaged would be the developing patterns of elements,
rather than the element s themselves—just as we remember melodies, not notes.
In a complex environment, it might even be possible to use contrapuntal techniques: moving pattern
s of opposing melodies s or rhythms. These are sophisticate d methods, and must be consciously
developed.
We need fresh thought on the theory of forms which are perceived as continuity over time, as well as
on design archetypes which exhibit a melodic sequence of image elements or a formed succession
of space, texture, motion, light, or silhouette.

10. Names and Meanings: Non-physical characteristics which may enhance the imageability of an
element. Names, for example, are important in crystallizing identity. They occasionally give locational
clues (North Station). Naming systems (as in the alphabetizing of a street series), will also facilitate the
structuring of elements. Meanings and associations, whether social, historical, functional, economic,
or individual, constitute an entire realm lying beyond the physical qualities we deal with here. They
strongly reinforce such suggestions toward identity or structure as may be latent in the physical form
itself.

All of the above-mentioned qualities do not work in isolation Where one quality is present alone (as a
continuity of building material with no other common feature), or the qualities are in conflict (as in
two areas of common building type but of different function), the total effect may be weak, or
rUeRqBuAirN
e TeHffEoOrtRtYo identify and structure. A certai2n0a
19mount of repetition, redundancy and reinforcement
seems to be necessary. Thus a region would be unmistakable which had a simple form, a continuity
of building type and use, which was singular in the city, sharply bounded, clearly jointed to a
neighbouring region, and visually concave.