Urban Design

1
Urban Design Planning

• Tom Turner
• University of Greenwich
• School of Architecture and Construction
• 0208 331 9100
• Email t.turner_at_gre.ac.uk
• Website www.landscapeplanning.gre.ac.uk

2
Questions

• IS TOWN DESIGN URBAN DESIGN?
• ARE THEY TOWN PLANNING?

3
Origins

• Town is a noun and town design would be the
  art of designing a physical object. One of the
  UKs modernist architect-planner-landscape
  architects (Sir Frederick Gibberd) wrote a book
  on Town Design
• A City is a place where people, and buildings,
  behave in civil, polite or considerate
  manner to each other
• Urban (from the Latin urbs, meaning city), is
  an adjective so that urban design is the art of
  making a place more city-like
• Urban Design is more process than product
• Therefore URBAN DESIGN is not TOWN DESIGN

4
Town Planning

• Even if not designed in advance, all towns have
  a plan. Lets look at some historic examples and
  see what influenced their plans .
• Catal Huyuk, 6,000 BCE
• Iron Age Hut, 600 BCE
• Greek-Roman Town, 79 CE
• Medieval City, c1300 CE
• Baroque City, c1750 CE
• BCEBefore Common Era CECommon Era

5
A City c6000BCE

• The worlds oldest city is said to be Catal Huyuk
  (pronounced chatal hooyook) in Central Turkey.
  Access to the dwellings was from roof level.
  Living here, you had to behave in a much more
  civic manner than living in a rough hut on a
  bare hill.

6
Iron Age Camp c 500BC
This is how people who did not live in cities
lived, all over Europe, until the Roman conquest.
The only planning principle was a ring of
defences, to make a Hill Fort
7
The City in 79 AD Pompeii

• Pompeii was buried by Vesuvius and can represent
  most of the planned cities in Europe from 500
  BC to 500 AD, as well as most of the colonial
  cities (eg in South America) from 1452-1700 AD).
  It was a walled city, designed to be able to
  defend itself.

8
Photographs of Pompeii

• The main features of Pompeii are exactly as
  described by Vitruvius
• A grid of streets
• Pavements stepping stones
• Water supply
• Drainage system
• Public buildings at important positions
• No windows
• Internal courts

9
The Medieval City (c1300)
The main consideration was defense, provided by a
high wall and narrow streets. Nuremberg in 1516
(below, from Benevolo) The city was founded in
1040 AD.
10
Planning origins

• Now let us consider the word planning
• It comes from the activity of drawing a plan in
  2 dimensions on a flat surface
• Maps and Plans have a very important place in
  human history.
• They enable the organisation of land, and travel,
  and the creation of empires.
• This type of Planning produced the Baroque City

11
The Baroque City c 1750
Baroque cities were dominated by stars of
avenues, designed to glorify the autocrat and
facilitate the movement of soldiers and the
firing of canon at revolting peasants,
12
Industrial City (c1900)(baroque citymore
bldsrailwaysparkssewers
13
Organising Principles mostly singleobjective

• Catal Huyuk, 6,000 BCE Defense against nomadic
  herders
• Iron Age Hut, 600 BCE Defense against other
  agriculturalists
• Greek-Roman Town, 79 CE Defense against armies
• Medieval City, c1300 CE Defense against knights
• Baroque City, c1750 CE Defense against
  revolutionaries
• Industrial City, c1900 Defense against cholera
• 21st Century City, c2000 One could argue that
  the new organising principle will be Defense
  against crime

14
Interim Conclusions

• City planning has been dominated by
  considerations of Engineering Security
• When this fact was appreciated (eg by the
  Viennese architect Camillo Sitte The art of
  building cities, 1889) it led to a campaign for
  architects to take responsibility for Town
  Design, Civic Design and the City Beautiful
  Movement.
• Architects tended to see cities as architecture
  writ large, with buildings instead of rooms and
  streets instead of corridors. It was a bit like
  arguing that a Beautiful Body is the main thing
  in life

15
Town design
16
Planning Modern Post-Modern

• Marx and Lenin believed that all economic and
  social activity could and should be planned.
• It did not work.
• But it does not follow that planning is
  impossible.
• Rather, planning is something to be done by many
  organisations in many ways for many reasons.
• It has changed from a Modernist Activity to a
  Post-Modernist Activity.

17
There was also a tendency to draw plans on white
paper

• Existing Site Drawing

18
City as landscape
I wrote that (p.103) Too often, architects have
seen the land on which they build as sheets of
white parchment on which to write new projects.
In reality, every work of architecture is a
conversion of the existing environment. When
writing on the parchments of history, new
buildings should converse with the stones, listen
to the wind and speak to the flowers. The
languages of the post-modern environment are of
prime importance. I also, bravely, wrote a
chapter on The Tragedy of Feminine Design
19
The Tragedy of Feminine Design
This illustration shows the natural roles of
men and women
20
This illustration shows the natural roles of
men and women on design projects
21
Here we see the brilliant results of a male
(hunter) approach to urban design
22
Here is the result of arrogant male urbanism
(Pruitt-Igoe, July 15, 1972 at 3.32pm)

• Happily, we can date the death of Modern
  Architecture to a precise moment in time
  (Charles Jencks The Language of Post-Modern
  Architecture, Part 1, Chapter 1)

23
Now lets turn to the animal kingdom

• The Male Emperor (left) shows great prowess in
  puffing out his chest
• The Female Empress looks more thoughtful

24
Here is a cow - slain by the hunter
25
2-dimensional views of the city

• From Modern Town and Country Planning
• (Thomas Adams, 1932, revised by JWR Adams, 1952)
• Thomas Adams did a plan for New York City in the
  1930s

26
2-dimensions -gt3-dimensions

• Frontispiece to Modern Town and Country Planning
  (Thomas Adams, 1932, revised by JWR Adams, 1952)

27
The trouble with males..

• .is that they only ever want one thing

28
The Tragedy of Feminine Design

• The tragedy of feminine design is that it
  receives so little official support (Turner, T.,
  City as landscape p.132)
• Does anyone agree?
• We need urban design to based on wisdom,
  pluralism, subtlety, common sense

29
Levi-Strauss Landscape

• The structuralist philosopher was interested in
  surface structures and deep structures
• He believed you must look beneath the surface to
  understand the world
• One then finds all sorts of sophisticated
  processes geology, hydrology, ecology, colour,
  emotion, ownership, tradition, trust,

30
Rubber Bands
31
Overlapping Zones
32
Venn Diagrams of City Planning 1
33
Venn Diagrams of City Planning 2
34
Here is what Modernism did to rivers

• The four stages of scientific river planning.
  Multiple uses are converted to a single use. The
  fish dies.

35
Modernist/Scientific Road Planning
36
Planning with GIS

• Just as the political basis for planning has
  changed so the technology of planning has
  changed.
• The 2-dimensional plan has been replaced by the
  multi-dimensional Geographical Information
  System
• I have thrown out my rapidographs and given up
  Autocad
• Perhaps we should speak of Gis-ing instead of
  Planning
• The chief theorist of this approach is the
  Scots-American Ian McHarg

37
McHarg Richmond Parkway (Ch4)

• The great strength of the method was the use of
  descriptive overlays AND evaluative overlays

38
McHarg Richmond Parkway (Ch4)

• X-Ray Overlay Route Determination

39
McHarg Diagram

• This method, apparently to logical, has had a bad
  influence on GIS-based planning.

40
Planning by Layers

• Layers are needed for future plans, as well as
  information about the present
• Layers represent sets of ideas (eg geology)
• Layers can translate directly into visual images

41
Hyde Park Montage (Ben Jarrett)

• Historical Layer Lifestyle Layer

42
Video Wall (Ben Jarrett)

• Historical Layer (Speakers Corner) Futuristic
  Layer (Internationalism)

43
An error

• We must not think that GIS, being a more powerful
  technology, gives more power to those who use the
  technology. At best, GIS is a decision support
  system. Ian McHarg was wrong to suggest that it
  can be a decision making system and that
  anyone using the same method will come to the
  same conclusion.
• But McHarg is, rightly, recognised as a pioneer
  by the GIS community and many share the old
  scientific-modernist dream of (mad!) scientists
  taking over from politicians as the ultimate
  decision-makers.
• It was a non-democratic/autocratic procedure

44
Where? and What?
45
What if?

• Both the following procedures allow questions
  land to be planned to protect and create Public
  Goods
• The Environmental Assessment (EA) System
• The Development Control system (UK)

46
Landscape Assessment Design
47
An opportunity to seize

• Joining the word Landscape with a GIS approach
  to Planning gives us a great opportunity.
• We can use GIS to conserve and improve the
  environment with this word used to describe a
  very wide range of objectives. They relate to
• NATURAL PROCESSES
• SOCIAL PROCESSES
• AESTHETIC IDEAS
• DESIGN ARCHETYPES

48
Pattern Analysis Diagrams
49
PAKILDA

• Pattern-Assisted-Knowledge-Intensive-Landscape-Des
  ign-Approach

50
Zone of Visual Influence ZVI
51
Skyline Planning
52
Examples

• I will finish by looking at Hydrology as an
  example of a subject for Pattern Analysis and
  Design

53
Hydrological Planning
54
Planning for the Song Thrush
55
Water Infiltration (Recharge) Policy(Jessica
Read)
56
Water Detention (Retention) Policy (Jessica Read)
57
Cities as Concepts

• One needs a concept of what a city IS in order to
  plan its future.

58
Landscape Planning BookCover
59
Statutory Non-Statutory Planning

• The UK enacted the Town and Country Planning Act
  in 1947
• Since then every municipality has had a statutory
  duty to prepare a Local Plan
• This has done no good at all for planning Public
  Open Space
• Much more has been achieved with Non-Statutory
  plans
• This is very encouraging!
• The pen is mightier than the sword The idea
  is mightier than the law

60
Conclusions

• Planning is an inherently Modernist activity.
  It suggests One Authority One Way One Plan
  One Result The International Modern City
• Urban Design is a more Post-Modern conception.
  It is multi-cultural, suggesting Many
  Authorities Many Ways Many Plans Many Results.
• This requires Many Layers Many Approaches
  Many Professions
• A final question What should the 21st Century
  City Symbolise?

61
Symbolism

• Mumford sees the hieroglyph (left) as a defensive
  enclosure with a crossroads dividing the city
  into four quarters and comments that if this is
  in fact a symbolic plan it would be the best
  possible symbol for the classic city
• Osiris tomb chamber (centre), covered by a mound
  and representing The Creation (an island coming
  out of the primordial waters)
• The Baroque City was a symbol of the Sun King
  autocracy
• What should the twenty-first century city
  symbolise?