banik-schweitzer_renate transformation with new typologies.pdf

7/27/2019 Banik-Schweitzer_Renate TRANSFORMATION with new typologies.pdf

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Renate Banik- Schweitzer

D.I. (arch.) Dr.

[email protected]

Vienna: Transformation of the Cityscape by Different Urban Typologies

Preliminary remark

In the professional literature published by urban geographers, historians, architectural and

urban design theorists there is no generally accepted distinction between urban morphology

and typology. The following observations refer to urban typology understood as a system of

space forming rules valid in a specific society during a specific period of time. This definition

combines urban form with specific social relations in the course of time, i.e. in history.

The traditional European city

For about 2000 years the urban typology of the European city was that of the steet / plaza -

perimeter block - city: the street network defined the perimeter of the blocks and the

continuous facades of (multi-storey) terraced (row) houses at the perimeter (volumes) formed

together with the ground area of the street/ plaza the open space of the steet/ plaza (voids).

Both form elements defined each other mutually. In the traditional European city the steet/

plaza was the public domain and the block the private. As space is a social product, the street/

plaza in particular had to satisfy political, cultural, social and economic needs of

communication and not only of physical transport as it is widely understood today.

This typology even worked when in the 19th

century, driven by industrialization and new

communication and transportation means, functional zoning began to spread. Planning

theorists like Ildefons Cerd and practitioners organized the street space in a way that public

and private traffic moved in parallel lines, the fastest in the middle of the street, the slowest,

the pedestrians, at the edge on sidewalks, offering access to the blocks. If the streets were not

wide enough fast traffic lines were constructed underground. The decisive elements for the

communication between block and street were the pedestrian sidewalks and semi-public


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spaces in the ground floors of the blocks like shops, restaurants/ cafs/ bars, entertainment

places etc.

The traditional European city

The urban typology of the traditional European city was not confined to the larger elements

like streets/ plazas and blocks these elements themselves were composed of smaller

typological elements, the already mentioned terraced houses.

Housing typologies in Vienna

1 Artisans house 18th c.;

2, 3 Early apartment house, 1st

half of 19th

c.;

4 Apartment house, since 1840;5 Apartment house, Palace type only in Ringstrasse zone since 1860;

6 Apartment house dumb-bell type, double type 4, since 1870

4 6

1 2 3 5


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In greater numbers still existing housing types in Vienna range from the artisans house from

the 18th

century to the Ringstrasse- apartment palace in the second half of the 19th

century.

There are also a few areas with free standing one- family houses (villas) but the majority of

the houses were apartment houses, at the end of the 19th

century most of them of the dumb-

bell- type.

Perimeter blocks and typical terraced houses (mostly dumb-bell type) in the 2nd half of the 19th century in theworking class district Ottakring in Vienna

In Vienna this type shows some interesting features. On the one hand the housing type for the

middle class and for the working class is identical. From looking at the facades one cannot

distinguish between middle and working class house. The social differentiation happens

inside the house: to divide the floor space into small apartments, containing one room and a

kitchen, it was necessary to construct an interior corridor that allowed no direct lighting and

ventilation of the kitchens.


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Middle class apartment house

4 apartments /floor

Working class apartment house

8 apartments /floor

The functionalist city

It was the Fordist society of the 20th

century that created a new urban typology, that of the

functionalist city. A welfare economy based on mass production and mass consumption and

indebted to economies of scale demanded a change in the urban typology. About the middle

of the 20

th

century CIAM formulated the basic rules of the functionalist city:


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The functionalist city

Roland Rainer, Planungskonzept Wien (1962)

In the functionalist city not only the perimeter block disappeared but the traditional street as

well. The terraced houses on small plots in the perimeter block were replaced by free-

standing, often prefabricated slabs and towers on large superblocks with an independent

sidewalk system and the former parallel traffic lines in the street were spatially separated. But

from this new problems arose. If one looks for instance at Ludwig Hilberseimers Plan of a

High- rise City 1924 or at elevated pedestrian malls of New Towns it should have been clear

to everybody that such vast spaces never would be filled with urban life. Functionalist

planners created public space over or under motorways (Paris, La Defense, Montreal, Atlanta,

USA) which were never adequately used by the public. After some time it turned out again

that the ground level still was the optimal space for all sorts of pedestrian public

communication. People who were happy with the higher quality of living in monofunctional

residential areas had to pay for this advantage with a severe loss of urbanity.

L. Hilberseimer, Hochhausstadt, 1924 Vienna 21., Donaucity, 2008


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Transforming the traditional city

Even during the dominance of the functionalist city there was a second way of further

developing the traditional city by transforming it.

As early as 1912 the influential Viennese architect Otto Wagner developed an urban typology

that on a modular basis allowed for the continuous growth of a metropolis. This model did not

adopt functional zoning, each so called district was an independent multifunctional urban

module. And this compact city could be realized within the slightly modified traditional

typology.

Otto Wagner, Die Grostadt, 1912

In the interwar period the superblocks of Red Vienna many of them designed by former

students of Otto Wagner looked like perimeter blocks from the outside but did not consist of

terraced houses any longer and the buildings inside the block showed a rather free design.


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Vienna 3., Rabenhof, 1928 Vienna 12., Am Fuchsenfeld, 1924 (Photo 1959)

Nearly half a century later one can see in Brasilia, the functional city par excellence, a

tendency of bringing street and building block together again. But the buildings parallel to the

street are still too far away and cannot form a continuous street space.

Brasilia, Supercuadras (L. Benevolo, Die Geschichte der Stadt, 4th Edition, 1990)


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The Hybrid city

Functionalism worked in industrially developed countries until about the 1980ies. Then

globalization and flexibilisation of production brought the model of the Fordist society to an

end. Large industrial plants moved to cheaper locations in countries with lower wages.

In developed countries the new enterprises were smaller and more eco- friendly which again

supported multifunctionality. All this made the model of the compact traditional city

attractive again. For new development areas and for the transformation of older parts of the

city a hybrid urban typology emerged

The hybrid city

According to the development of land- ownership, financing systems and the construction

industry the new blocks were much larger than the old ones so that much larger buildings

could be constructed instead of the rather small terraced houses of the 19th

century. Within the

blocks the buildings could stand free but on the perimeter they had to form street walls

again. In the end this new hybrid urban typology aimed at the revival of the street in all its

cultural complexity.


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Paris Tolbiac, Boulevard de France, 2007 Valencia, Avenida de Francia, 2010

One of the most visible features of the hybrid typology was the reappearance of the tramway

in many big cities (Paris, Nantes, Bordeaux, Barcelona, Valencia etc.). In Vienna this was no

surprise because the city never had abandoned its tramway network.

Paris, Porte dItalie, 2010 Valencia, 2010

Interventions in the traditional city under dominance of functionalist thinking

In the existing old parts of the traditional city interventions following the functionalist model

in Vienna like in other cities often produced negative effects. In Vienna for instance the street

space was devaluated by destroying the transparency of the facades on street level by the

construction of garages on ground floor.


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Vienna 18., Schulgasse, 2005 Vienna, 3., Hetzgassse, 2010

This caused a tunneleffect which made streets unattractive for pedestrians to pass.

Moreover, the additional parking space is not large enough to offer a lasting solution for the

parking problem and some of the new ground floor garages stay empty because the rents are

too high.

The same tunnel effect happens when doors and windows on ground floor are walled up.

How much people want the transparency of ground floor facades shows the example of a

well known restaurant in Vienna: the three windows on the left are painted on a closed facade.

Walling up ground floor facades

Vienna 3., Seidlgasse, 2010

Against tunneleffect: left: three painted

windows, Vienna 3., Weissgerberlnde, 2010

Also a tunnel effect had the infill of new functionalist houses into old perimeter blocks.

The ground floor in the new houses was much lower than in the older buildings and was not

considered to be suitable for residential use. The mostly closed walls on ground floor of the

new houses have a similar rejecting effect.


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Vienna, 3., Marxergasse, 2007 Vienna, 3., Marxergasse, 2007

The facades of the 19th century buildings in Vienna put another specific problem. These

houses are built of bricks covered with plaster and the facades are decorated with industrially

prefabricated ornaments made of so called Roman concrete, a very durable and easily to

process material. These ornaments play an important role in the design of the facade.

Removing them destroys the character and the proportions of the facade and gives it a boring

look. Many of theses ornaments were destroyed during the Second World War and were

never replaced. Today the surviving facades are endangered by a publicly subsidized heat

insulation program that attaches plastic insulation panels to plain facades.

Vienna 9., Schwarzspanierstasse, 2010 Vienna 3., Marxergasse, 2010


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Functionalist thinking does not see the existing traditional street as a social communication

space any longer. Therefore the public has no doubts about converting the public street space

into a junk space by filling it with garbage containers, advertising boards etc.

Vienna, 3.,Marxergasse, 2007 Vienna, 16.,Hofferplatz, 2010

Still more destructive are larger functionalist interventions in the traditional fabric. A good

example is Vorgartenstrae in Vienna. This very long traditional street has a distinct form that

differs from other parallel streets in the neighborhood: in the second half of the 19th

century it

was designed as a residential street with front gardens (Vorgarten in German) between street

and terraced houses. The four after the Second World War inserted free standing functional

slabs interrupt the continuous street space and diminishes its grandeur.

In the worst case functionalist interventions can completely destroy traditional forms.

Vienna 2.,

Vorgartenstrasse


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One of the most striking examples is Mozartplatz, one of the few so- called crossroads- plazas

in Vienna. One corner building of the plaza was demolished and replaced by a large free-

standing functionalist building that completely contradicts the old form and makes the shape

of the plaza obsolete.

Vienna 4., Mozartplatz, repeated transformation, last: 1978


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Successful transformations

But there are also positive examples in Vienna. Many mistakes in transforming the traditional

urban structures could have been avoided by better understanding the specific spatial logic of

different urban typologies.

Starting with the smallest element, the apartment house from the second half of the 19th

century, it is obvious from what has been said before that it is no great problem to transform a

working class house with small apartments into a middle class house with larger apartments

and all necessary modern infrastructure. Compared with modern apartment houses the

modernized old ones offer the advantage of large and high rooms and eco- friendly building

materials (bricks, plaster, timber).

combining 2 apartments:

4 apartments instead of 8

direct access

to each apartment

from staircase

direct access to light and air

for kitchens

sanitary rooms included to

apartments

Converting a working class apartment house from the 2nd half of the 19th century

into a modern middle class house


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The most urgent problem for the traditional city today is the parking problem. It can be partly

solved by multi-storey car parks that are free of emissions and can be integrated into

perimeter blocks.

Multi-storey car park, Dresden Neustadt, 2010 Multi-storey car park, Vienna, 1.,Glsdorfgasse, 2010

After the 1970ies architects have become more aware of the qualities of the traditional street.

New housing infills are no longer constructed before or behind the building line and the

transparency of the ground floor zone is respected again.

Vienna 9., Wiesengasse, 2010 Vienna 2., Untere Donaustrasse, 2010


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The demands of the flexible economy of today partly meet the wish to revitalize the ground

floor zone. In hot spots small shops, workshops, offices, restaurants etc. spread and can pay

higher rents than a house owner can get from letting a ground floor garage.

Vienna 18., Schopenhauerstrasse, 2005 Vienna 18., Schulgasse, 2005

Another example one may not call a positive one. But an orderly disappearance of a plaza has

not necessarily to be called negative.

In 1825 another of the few crossroads- plazas showed its original four corners. In 1920 the

plaza had three corners and today it has only two. Though it does not seem at the moment that

the two corner houses left will be demolished in the near future it can happen and the plaza

then will have disappeared completely. What will be left then is a simple street crossing. After

all this seems to be a better solution than the transformation of Mozartplatz.

Vienna 8.,

Ludwig- Sackmauer-Platz, 2000

Vienna 8.,


Historischer Atlas von Wien

Vienna 8.,


Historischer Atlas von Wien


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Vienna 8., Ludwig- Sackmauer-Platz (north), 2010 Vienna 8., Ludwig- Sackmauer-Platz (south), 2010

Good examples of transformed traditional urban typologies are the best support for arguing in

favour of transformation against the erasure of urban history and the new beginning from

scratch. The functionalist city was successful merely in a short period of time and the

application of its principles to the traditional city brought more damage than benefits. But to

convince the public of such a changed attitude seems to be the greatest problem today.

banik-schweitzer_renate transformation with new typologies.pdf

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