urban morphology topic

7/27/2019 Urban Morphology Topic

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16 | Urban Design | Winter 2005 | Issue 93

TOPIC

Urban morphology is not a user-friendly term and a straw poll of 20 people who take

decisions which shape our towns and cities reveals that few could give a working

definition of the term. Yet the changes to the patterns of urban form which will take

place over the next generation will be dramatic. They are the result of a myriad of designdecisions taken by a wide spectrum of people including planners, engineers, , architects,

urban designers, politicians and others, seeking to address existing problems rather than

take a hard, long term look at the future shape of our towns. As a result, the culmination

of a series of highway improvements, local plan designations and architectural

responses to sites where the long term context is unknown, result in towns growing like

a woman ever pregnant against her wishes. We are still too often building photogenic

pods, driven by sites rather than movement structures.

Hold on you say, this is what the urban design community, government ministers,

CABE, UDG and UDAL are addressing; development frameworks, cross-disciplinarydesign statements and codes will bring coherence. Well, in part; sub-regional strategies

are broadly looking at capacities while urban design guidance has been primarily

concerned with neighbourhood and street levels of design. The gap is in taking

responsibility for the overall shape of a town, not just as an assembly of land uses hard-

wired by road schemes, but as a coherent and legible spatial structure which originates

from a pattern of movement lines which will be unique to a particular topography.

In this issue Jeremy Whitehand identifies the failure of urban design to draw on

urban morphology, a view echoed by Peter Larkham who notes the inattention of many

urban designers to the lessons of history. Andy Wharton underlines the connectionsbetween morphological analysis and the methodology of landscape characterisation.

While Bill Hilliers contribution describes developments in Space Syntax analysis,

Brenda Scheer cites a situation where cities let developers plan residential areas and

highway engineers join up the bits, and Nicola Marzot observes that the hierarchical

structure of the city has been replaced by a network of centres net-city. This is the

first time this journals topic is dedicated to urban morphology and the papers sketch

out a territory that is critical to urban design but which has largely been the preserve

of academia There remains a gap in urban design practice which we must heed. Do we

want to actively shape our towns as human habitats or are we going to wait and see whathappens to us?

ROGER EVANSis an architect, town planner, and urban designer, past Chair of the Urban Design Group, and founder of Roger Evans Associates.

URBAN MORPHOLOGY


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Urban Design | Winter 2005 | Issue 93 | 17

TOPIC

The terms urban fabric, urban tissue andurban grain are very suggestive. They hintat both the tangible substance of a townand the intricacies of pattern. It is too easy,

however, to leave them as just a metaphor,a fine cover to an empty book. Urban fabricis not similar to a piece of cloth, it isakind of material with its own properties.The fertile direction for the analogylies in the recognition that the internalstructure of a material has a fundamentalbearing on how it behaves under stressor when it is manipulated. Differentmaterials have their own distinct handlingcharacteristics.

Those with skill and experienceunderstand that a material has a bias. Ithas strengths and weaknesses, limits andpotentials depending on the way it is cut orjoined and the forces or stresses applied to it, inrelation to the bias of its internal structure.

The primary concern of urbanmorphology is the structure of urbanform. So, if an understanding of internalstructure is essential to successfulmanipulation of a material, urbanmorphology is essential to urbanism andurban design.

The figurative and impressionisticuse of terms such as urban fabric andgrain only hint at the idea of structure.

But the structure of urban form (orspatial configuration, take your pick) ispervasive and, perhaps more importantly,there are different kinds of structurewith different characteristics at differentscales. Individual buildings, at one levelof scale, do not have the same handlingcharacteristics as a street, at another, or atown as a whole at yet another.

The generic structure of urban form isa hierarchy of levels related part to whole.That is to say, one of the characteristics ofurban form is that it divides into distinctlevels. The patterns found at differentlevels such as street/block, plot series,plot, building, cell and structure are notinterchangeable and the long term successof a design depends on understandingnot only the differences but also therelationships between levels. The levels areinterdependent.

Nor is attention to such questions ofstructure merely a formalistic diversion.The structure of urban form is the productof a social/cultural process and thestructures at different levels correspondto distinct cultural habits, from the more

generic such as paths to the progressivelymore particular: nucleated settlements,property ownership by land parcel,detached houses, conservatories or lightsteel frame construction.

And while the generic structure of levels remains relativelyconstant across cultures, there is immense variation of specificstructures (both between and within cultures) corresponding todifferences in social habits.

At this point it is common to infer that urban morphology isessentially equivalent to urban history. If that is the case, thenstructural engineering and materials science are nothing morethen a branch of the history of technology.

The only way to begin to understand the handlingcharacteristics of a material is to examine and experiment withit, test it to destruction. The results of experiments can onlybe gathered after the fact. Understanding (and the ability topredict) can only ever improve in hindsight. In this context, thebuilt environment is a vast record of previous experiments. Thisline of thinking suggests that we need to experiment to improveour understanding but that we can only really improve if wepay attention to the results.

The identification of the generic structure of levels of scaleand variation in specific structures as products of cultural habitsbecomes a powerful critical tool. A morphological critique isnecessarily a cultural critique (although the links to humanhabits may be more or less explicit).

Why, for example, despite volumes of urban design guidancepromoting permeability, is it so rare to find new developmentthat fully integrates main routes between settlements or roadsdirectly linking main routes (radials and counter-radials)?

In most cases the location of the site for development andrestrictions imposed on access from routes with relativelyhigh volumes of traffic means new development is effectivelycreating pods, loops and cul-de-sacs when seen at a higher levelof scale. The connected routes that may be achieved withinthe site still only lead back to one, maybe two routes. Even theareas of connected streets remain visually as impenetrableand confusing as classic cul-de-sac tree layouts due to the overreliance on T-junctions and ninety degree speed reduction

bends to achieve what is laughingly called natural trafficcalming.

What ideas and habits generate these forms? Notsurprisingly, as human habits, they are sometimes irrationaland contradictory. Word and deed do not correspond.

THE HANDLING CHARACTERISTICS OF URBAN FORMKarl Kropf considers the essential elements of urban structure

The idea of genericand specific structuregoes beyond thesuperficial analogy ofgrain to articulatethe complexity anddiversity of a town atdifferent levels of scalecorresponding to a rangeof human habits.


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Everyone demonises the car for global warming, profligateenergy use, congestion, pollution, noise, cluttering the publicrealm, speeding and other safety hazards but its always everyoneelses car. People want the convenience of driving but dont wantto see any other car, certainly not down their street. It is a form ofbehaviour that has many attributes in common with addiction:increasing use with a refusal to acknowledge the level of use andits consequences.

There are other habits that perpetuate pod developments withillegible street networks: lack of investment in public transport,

lack of imagination and will to solve the challenge of integratingdifferent modes of movement in the same space, continuedapplication of received ideas and assumptions in highway design(limited access motorways as the ideal), a planning processthat is fundamentally reactive, allocating land for developmentby default, the abdication of public bodies in the design of thepublic realm.

But the root habit is the aggregate of public behaviour.By their purchasing preferences for large vehicles (to staysafe), suburban houses (to live on a quiet street) and out oftown shopping (to avoid town centre congestion), people areexpressing a dislike for the wider implications of the car. Butthose very choices increase the use of the car. The hangover cureis the hair of the dog that bit you: more of the same.

Two aspects of car use in particular show extremely clearsigns of addictive behaviour: the level of use and speeding. Themore you get the more you want. Give people the space and theywill use it to drive ever more and bigger cars at ever higher speed(fuelled, as it were, by a no less pathological motor industry - aclear example of co-dependence).

Current wisdom identifies the cause of the problem in thephysical arrangement of the highway. Straight wide roads induceincreased use and speed so the cure is to change the roads. Streetsare deliberately pinched and contorted to physically restrictspeed and convenience.

But physical restraint is notoriously ineffective in curbingcompulsive or addictive behaviour. Car use and speeding are

social and behavioural problems not environmental problems.Physical restraint may work as part of a package of measures buta more important step is for all individuals to acknowledge theextent to which their own behaviour is ruining their lives.

And aside from being ineffective as a cure, physical restraint is

indiscriminate. Everyone must suffer thecure whether they need it or not.

Tellingly, neither is the cureapplied everywhere. Underlining thesocial nature of the problem, thoseadministering the medicine are complicitin the behaviour being treated. Essentiallythey tell us to behave ourselves in front ofthe neighbours but just around the cornerthey sell us the fix that keeps us addicted.If youre a good junkie and go quietlydown that residential street theyll giveyou a great rush inducing hit out on thering road.

More damaging still, the attemptto reduce car use and speed with the

layout of roads ignores the consequencesfor other aspects of urban form, whichis to say, the structure, character andusability of the places in which we live.It is a prime example of single issueurbanism. All resources of a particulargroup are directed at one problem.There is no appreciation of the handlingcharacteristics of the material beingdistorted. No attention is paid to theknock on effects, either on the overallstructure, legibility and visual hierarchyof the town as a whole, the streets orthe possible arrangement of plot series,individual plots and buildings relative tothe street.

The damage it does is enormous and,for all intents and purposes, irreversible.

More effective and, in the longrun, more successful urbanism andurban design will only come from abetter understanding of urban formas a material with a range of handlingcharacteristics. Urban morphology is nota formalistic diversion. It is at the root ofurbanism and urban design.

Karl Kropf is Director of Spatial Planning andResearch at Roger Evans Associates. He is also a

member of the Urban Morphology Research Group

at the University of Birmingham and Associate

Editor ofUrban Morphology.

Left Thorley Lane, Bishops Stortford: morphologicalknock on effects of speed reduction bends. Thegeometry of the roads makes it impossible toachieve a common orientation of buildings andthrough visibility.

Above Speed reduction bends result in a view down themain street that is terminated by a corner gableand the backs of houses facing another street.

The generic structure of

urban form is a hierarchy of levelsrelated part to whole


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A visitor from another planet, schooled in logic but ignorant ofthe behaviour of earthly folk, might have imagined that urbanmorphology would be one of the basic disciplines of whichurban design was an applied discipline. Urban morphology is,after all, the study of urban form, and an important part of urbandesign is the creation of urban form. It is reasonable that thediscipline that has as its central purpose the understanding ofurban form should contribute to both the theory and practiceof designing that form. Parallels with the relationships betweenbiosciences and medicine, and indeed more widely between basicand applied sciences come to mind.

The reality is different. In the English-speaking world casesin which urban design draws upon urban morphology arerarities. One such in Great Britain is the prize-winning Stratfordupon Avon District Design Guide about which the judgesof the Countryside Agency Award for Planning Rural Areasand Communities commented that it uses a morphologicalapproach. This particular design guide was largely produced bya PhD graduate whose thesis was on urban morphology (Kropf,

1993). Furthermore, the thesis bridged the divide between urbanmorphology and urban design. In doing so it made one of thoseall too rare crossings of the boundary between the disciplines ofgeography and architecture - a boundary, indeed a barrier, in botheducation and research, that has a strength practically worldwide

that has no rational basis. That divideprovides much of the explanation for theweakness of the relationship between thestudy of urban form on the one hand andthe design of that form on the other.

URBAN LANDSCAPE MANAGEMENT

Although the need for a close relationbetween knowledge of urban formand its application in urban designmay be self-evident, what matters forpractical purposes is the nature andapplication of this relationship in actualtowns and cities. Fortunately, in spiteof interdisciplinary myopia, to use Ivor

Samuels apposite term (Samuels, 2003),evidence of the potential value of urbanmorphology in the armoury of urbandesigners is to hand. Although not wellknown among urban designers, urban

URBAN MORPHOLOGY, URBAN LANDSCAPE ANDFRINGE BELTSJWR Whitehand advocates a greater role for morphology in urban design

View north across Birminghams Edwardian fringe belt, c1995. The city centre is inthe top right-hand corner, and the urban fringe some seven kilometres behind thecamera. Reproduced with the permission of the Calthorpe Estate


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issues pertinent to urban design for overhalf a century. This has been evidentnot least within the small but livelyfield of what urban morphologistssometimes refer to as urban landscape (ortownscape) management.

The origins of urban landscapemanagement are intimately connected

to the nature and development of animportant part of urban morphologyitself (Conzen, 1966). That part isconcerned with tracing how the physicalconfigurations of cities have developedover time. The ways of doing this becameincreasingly refined in the course ofthe 20th century. By the middle of thatcentury the implications of the patternsrecognised and explanations offeredwere being considered in relation toprescriptions of urban form, particularlytownscape conservation (Conzen, 1958).An important basis for urban landscapemanagement was the urban landscapeunits (or morphological regions)identified from systematic survey andanalysis of the historical development oftowns and cities. As a purely descriptiveactivity (urban morphography) this hadbeen discredited in the German-speakingworld in the inter-war years. But, linkedto the social, economic and culturalforces driving the development of urbanareas, systematic surveying and mappingof ground plans, building types, and landand building use became fundamental to

the recognition of urban landscape units.Such recognition became, in the post-war period, a method of characterisingthe various parts of towns at differentscales of analysis, from the individualbuilding to entire settlements (Conzen,1960). The delineation of unitary areasnot only distinguished historical types ofdevelopment but provided an importanttemplate with which to assess futuredevelopment (Conzen, 1975). PresagingBritish conservation areas by nearly adecade and English Heritage ExtensiveUrban Surveys by nearly half a century,they offered an important method ofassessing and delimiting character areasin a way that connected them to the restof the urban area. For design purposesthey had particular value within existingurban areas but there were lessons too forthe design of entirely new areas.

A PLANNING PHILOSOPHY

An especially important aspect of thismid-20th-century work was the links itestablished between developing formson the ground and long and medium-

term historical changes, such as theadoption of innovations in transportand fluctuations in house building. Inparticular there was recognition that thephysical character of urban areas was the

embodiment of great variations over time in the form of urbanextensions and the incidence and type of change within existingurban areas. With this recognition came a planning philosophy:a philosophy grounded in the belief that to experience urbanlandscapes as historico-geographical phenomena was animportant means of benefiting from the successes and failures ofpast societies in their attempts to shape their built environments.The urban landscape as a vast reservoir of experiences passeddown by previous societies became recognised as an educative

source and therefore not lightly expendable but something tobe assessed, learned from, sometimes conserved and, not least,used to inform the creation of new urban landscapes. Especialattention was devoted to the way in which particular parts ofthe urban landscape had taken on different degrees and typesof historical expressiveness. These differences were embodiedin the urban landscape units that urban morphologists wererecognising.

EXEMPLIFYING URBAN LANDSCAPE UNITS

One type of urban landscape unit that has become widelyrecognised in many different culture areas is the urban fringebelt (commonly shortened to fringe belt). While all urbanlandscape units are in detail unique, they have recurrent features.The fringe belt is no exception, and its wide significance for theunderstanding and management of urban landscapes makes it agood illustration of both urban morphological thinking and thepotential of that thinking as a contribution to urban design.

A fringe belt is a product of the very large variations over

time in the speed of extension of towns and cities. It comes intoexistence during a period of very slow urban extension, oftenowing to a house-building slump (and associated reductions inland values) or a topographical or other geographical obstacleto housing development. Such a long pause in the outwardextension of an urban area tends to be associated with theformation of a distinctive zone encircling the built-up area.This is later embedded within the urban area and becomes asignificant element in its historico-geographical structuring.

THE CHARACTERISTICS OF FRINGE BELTS

The characteristics of fringe belts include (a) a sparse roadnetwork, with a low incidence of radial roads (ie running acrossthe fringe belt), and hence constituting a barrier zone to vehicles,although, those radial roads that do exist (being historical arterialroads leading out of the city) tend to be heavily used; (b) large,often well-vegetated plots, frequently containing institutional,sometimes landmark, buildings of architectural note; and(c) the fact that they form a boundary between historically andmorphologically distinct areas (Whitehand and Morton, 2004).They are heterogeneous in ground plans, building forms, andland and building use. Public utilities, parks, recreational areasand allotment gardens are characteristic of their medley of landuses (Whitehand and Morton, 2003).

Among the most striking fringe belts are those that formedaround medieval towns, especially associated with town walls,and, in Great Britain in particular, those that came into existence

at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20thcentury, especially during the slump in the house buildingbetween roughly 1908 and 1925. The latter, often referredto as Edwardian fringe belts in England, today separate twophysically contrasting housing zones: that of the late-Victorian

Attention is devoted largely toindividual buildings, sitesand monuments, or small areas

of special interest


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bye-law terraced houses, and that of theinter-war period, characterised by semi-detached houses with universal plans.Along much of its length an Edwardianfringe belt provides, internal to the city, a

green belt between these two zones.

HISTORICO-GEOGRAPHICAL STRUCTURE

AND DESIGNSince fringe belts are both ecologicallysignificant (Hopkins, 2004) and, mostimportantly, articulate the historico-geographical structure of towns and cities,they merit much more considerationthan they have received in planningand urban design. Their significance forenvironmental awareness is inseparablefrom their historical development.They provide practical geographicalorientation by providing a sense ofposition within or on the edge of the city,but at a deeper level of appreciation theyprovide a historico-geographical frameof reference within which the phasesof development, and physical forms,of previous societies are related to thephysical configurations of present cities.There is much more to an appreciationof this role than the recognition ofindividual sites of historical andarchitectural significance. To recognisethe structuring of an urban area in termsof fringe belts and intervening residentialzones is to take a more holistic cultural-environmental view of cities: the many

individual features that make up theurban scene take on added culturalsignificance from the way in whichthey relate to one another and combineto form historically composite urbanlandscapes.

The fact that little attempt has beenmade to explore fringe belts in relationto plan making and developmentcontrol exemplifies the neglect of urbanlandscape units in urban planning, asdistinct from their place in the studyof urban landscape development. InGreat Britain this does not reflect a lackof interest in history among plannersand others with responsibility for thebuilt environment - the designation ofconservation areas, listed buildings andparks and gardens of special historicinterest, for example, belies such anexplanation. More significant is thelack of awareness of the wider historico-geographical structure of cities. Amongthose with a custodial concern for thebuilt environment, attention is devotedlargely to individual buildings, sites andmonuments, or small areas of special

interest: the emphasis is on individualfeatures or small areas, rather than thehistorico-geographical structuring ofentire cities or sizeable parts of cities.This deficiency is very evident in UK

governmental publications on historical environments (see,for example, Department for Culture, Media and Sport, 2001).Paradoxically, fringe belts survive within urban areas as physicalentities redolent of the history of cities, but local plans, andcentral government policy documents, including those onhistorical environments, scarcely mention them.

TIME OF HOPE

Although the lack of synergy between urban morphology andurban design extends much more widely than the British casefocused on here, fortunately linkage between these two fieldshas been developing more fruitfully in several other countries,notably over recent decades in Italy and France. This has beenhelped by the stronger presence in these countries of urbanmorphology within architecture. In the English- speaking worldthe bridge between architecture and geography, and, related toit, that between urban morphology and urban design, has withonly a few exceptions been too weak to withstand more thanvery minor traffic. Yet both the logical and empirical bases forthe link are evident. Furthermore, within Great Britain there has,over the last decade or more, been increasing interest beyondacademe, for example within English Heritage, in mapping the

character of areas. This interest must surely lead, sooner or later,to strengthening the bridge between urban morphology andurban design. Let it be sooner.

JWR Whitehand, School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University

of Birmingham

REFERENCESConzen, MRG (1958), The growth and character of Whitby, in Daysh,

GHJ (ed) A survey of Whitby, Shakespeare Head Press, Eton, 49-89Conzen, MRG (1960), Alnwick, Northumberland: a study

in town-plan analysis, George Philip, LondonConzen, MRG (1966), Historical townscapes in Britain: a problem in applied

geography, in House, JW (ed.) Northern geographical essays in honour of GHJDaysh, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Newcastle upon Tyne, 56-78

Conzen, MRG (1975), Geography and townscape conservation, inUhlig H and Lienau, C (eds) Anglo-German Symposium in AppliedGeography, Giessen-Wrzburg-Mnchen, Lenz, Giessen, 95-102

Department for Culture, Media and Sport (2001) The historic environment: aforce for our future, Department for Culture, Media and Sport, London

Hopkins, MIW (2004), Using fringe belts to examine therelationships between urban morphology and urban ecology,unpublished PhD thesis, University of Birmingham

Kropf, KS (1993), An enquiry into the definition of built form in urbanmorphology, unpublished PhD thesis, University of Birmingham

Samuels, I (2003), The death and life of the urban block, unpublishedChristmas lecture to the Urban Design Group, London, 3 December 2003

Whitehand, JWR and Morton NJ Fringe belts and the recyclingof urban land: an academic concept and planning practice,Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 30, 819-839

Whitehand, JWR and Morton, NJ (2004) Urban morphologyand planning: the case of fringe belts, Cities 21, 275-289

A fringe belt is a productof the very large variationsover time in the speed ofextension of towns and cities


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more than the study of form itself. Recent research has examinedthe processes that have shaped form: the agents and agencies ofchange. More elusive, but also important in many contexts, arethe factors leading to non-change, especially in conserved urbanlandscapes.

A significant design-related question is the extent to whichfeatures persist in the urban landscape. Obviously, a certainamount of change can be catastrophic in its cause or in itsrapidity and extent. Change after natural or man-made disasteris one element; although some might argue that the extentof redevelopment in the post-war period, especially in thosetowns not suffering bomb damage, was also a disaster. It was anawareness of hostile reactions to this type of change that causedFrancis Tibbalds (1988) to suggest that we should not build toomuch in one place at one time (one of his ten commandmentsof urban design).

On the other hand, morphological studies in a wide range oflocations and contexts have shown that there is an inevitabilityabout urban change; it occurs everywhere at some scale andtime. This is, to borrow a geological metaphor, gradualisticchange. It may respond to changing fashion, for example the fadfor conservatories; to changing needs, for example the fittingof central heating or structures and spaces to cope with motorvehicles. At an urban scale, think of the 19th-century trend forurban parks, or the 20th-century requirement for civic centres.

We should also consider the natural and finite life-cycle ofstructures and building materials. Where we designate an area

or building as worthy of retention and conservation, there is (inthe developed West at least) an implication that such places andstructures will become insulated from this life cycle. And yet,even in such places, there is still pressure for change (Larkham,1996). Over the span of decades (three and a half decades since

UNDERSTANDING URBAN FORM?Peter Larkham discusses practical applications of morphologicalanalysis to planning and urban design

It has rightly been suggested thatknowledge of urban form (urbanmorphology equals the study of urbanform) is one of the essential things anurban designer should know about(Moudon, 1992). It is a part of the broaderpicture; an approach to conceptualisingthe complexity of physical form. Moudonstates that to build up actual knowledgein urban design, one should not look forthe correct approach or theory, but shouldinstead compile and assess all the researchthat adds to what the urban designer mustbe familiar with.

This is more than merely abstractknowledge. Understanding the physicalcomplexities of various scales, fromindividual buildings, plots, street-blocks,and the street patterns that make up thestructure of towns helps us to understandthe ways in which towns have grown anddeveloped. The qualities of place are oftenascribed, to a considerable extent, to suchphysical characteristics as size, scale, andrelative proportions of various elements.This knowledge helps us to appraise whatis successful and unsuccessful. It may also

but this is contentious for some designersat both architectural and urban scales

provide design cues for future forms.Yet, over the past two decades, the

study of urban form has become muchAbove Bullring,

Birmingham


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TOPICthe earliest conservation areas in the UK),

the amount of individually small-scaleand incremental change in some areashas caused a few conservation officersto question whether areas should be de-designated, such has been the change totheir character.

Carried further, morphologicalstudies have also tended to show that

there is a hierarchy of change withinurban features. Buildings can changefastest, from alterations to completedemolition and replacement, in reactionto changing use requirements includingan owners desire to personalise a house.So we have very few surviving medievalbuildings, more Georgian, many moreVictorian, and so on. Plot patterns canchange, by wholesale redevelopment butmore commonly through subdivisionand amalgamation, often associatedwith changing ownership. Yet, in manyUK towns, there are perceptible tracesof medieval plot patterns still persisting,and still influencing new developmentespecially through traditional frontagewidths (typically 33 feet). Most resistantto change is the street network, andso again we have towns whose basicstructure remains recognisably Romanor medieval; even though in most cases,individual streets have been straightenedor widened. Nowadays, the investment inunderground infrastructure beneath ourstreets helps to fossilise this pattern stillfurther.

Change to these apparently innatelyconservative street patterns does occur,but even catastrophes such as the GreatFire of London and the wartime blitzesresulted directly in surprisinglylittle change. Developing technologyhas done far more, particularly withstrategies to cope with the rising volumeof motor vehicles, including the fashionfor ring roads. Yet, in a number of recentcases, urban designers have suggestedthe reinstatement of long-vanished(often medieval) road alignments.Whilst this does have some groundingin urban history, does it really addresscontemporary needs?

COMPARISONS: BREADTH OF

KNOWLEDGE

One of the weaknesses of urbanmorphology has been that there are fewgenuine comparative studies, particularlyacross national boundaries. Few of ushave the linguistic ability to follow theprofessional literature in more thantwo languages. Yet there is much inurban form and process that transcends

current national boundaries, and a widerunderstanding would be potentiallyuseful. Where is the traditional boundarybetween the narrow, deep burgage plotand house typical of north-western

Europe, versus the courtyard plan common in Mediterraneanand eastern countries? And what are the implications of migrantcommunities wishing to import urban and architectural formsfamiliar to them, representing their traditional culture? Too oftenthese are felt to be alien in the urban landscape (as, it could besaid, were the structures and urban forms imposed by colonialconquerors).

One of the very few comparative studies of contemporarycities has been carried out for Seoul, Tokyo, Paris, London, New

York and Los Angeles, by members of the International Seminaron Urban Form. Funded by the Seoul Development Institute, itsought to show how Seoul, as an extremely fast-growing capitalcity, compared in form and process with other world cities. Aseries of residential and commercial areas, each 500m square,was examined for each city. The residential areas were selected torepresent similar social characteristics, and to be representativeof significant formative phases in the citys development.

This study clearly showed very substantial differences in thescale and physical form of development in these cities. Yet thereare also many features in common. The substantial proportion ofthe built area given over to roads and pavements; the issues of carparking in most residential areas; the uniformity of large expansesof urban fabric developed at one period; yet the lack of conscious

design at many levels, can be appreciated. We can see the physicalresults of various controlling mechanisms (planning systems,legal constraints, etc). The next stage is to distil the practicalapplications: not do and dont, but this is what can happen if....

FORM AND CHARACTEROn another level entirely, urban form is obviously a majorconstituent of character, that rather elusive concept soimportant in much conservation planning and design, but alsowith much wider relevance in non-protected areas. Althoughthere is guidance in the UK on character appraisal, it is virtuallycertain that not all designated conservation areas have fully-developed character appraisals, and non-designated areas havefar patchier coverage despite the brave suggestion by Tony Hall(1996) that this should be widespread and should underpindevelopment control decision-making and urban landscapemanagement.

Stratford upon Avon District Council produced an innovativedistrict design guide based on a detailed morphologically-informed approach (2001). Building on analysis of precedentswithin each area of the district, detailed advice is offered at scalesfrom settlement, street, open space, plot, building and material.This is independent of land use: the advice could be used for abroad range of development types. Nor is it prescriptive in termsof architectural style. Although complex, it was possible to conveythis message convincingly to both local politicians and public.

In reality, however, even detailed character appraisals basedon morphological analysis at the level of individual plots andbuildings can founder at the stage of an individual planningappeal. Will the Stratford guidance survive this test? Developersare increasingly proposing high-density development, to thedensities proposed in PPG3 (30-50/ha), within residential areas

which, although of distinct character, are not protected byconservation area designation. The result is very often that thedevelopment goes ahead. In my own, albeit limited, experience,a developer can disregard a detailed morphological characterappraisal, relying instead on general statements about the

It is virtually certain that not alldesignated conservation areas havefully-developed character appraisals


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residential character of this entiresuburban district; and base statementsof the high quality of the proposeddevelopment upon its conformity withPPG3s density standards.

In one recent Birmingham example,the inspector found that there wouldbe a marked change in character andappearance if 14 houses and a blockof apartments were built on suburbanback gardens, but that this would beacceptable: views into the site would not

be readily appreciated by passers-by,the demolition of a house would notform a significant variation in characteror appearance. Yet the characterand appearance of the area wouldbe materially harmed by more suchproposals (where is the threshold?), andthe inspector made no comment on thequality of the proposed new developmentitself, save that it would be very differentin character and appearance from that ofthe existing housing, and such backlanddevelopment will often be at variancewith the precise established natureof existing areas (Appeal APP/P4605/A/03/1120919).

WHY BOTHER ABOUT MORPHOLOGY?

Some of our most significant urbanproblems of the last century havearisen in cases where new urban andarchitectural forms have been developedat speed and to a large scale, but withlittle or no reference to existing urbanform and context. This includes the greatswaths of modernist post-war urbanredevelopment, criticised by so many

commentators, and the tower block,many of which are now being demolishedin the name of urban regeneration.

Conversely, there are places nowrecognised as being of high quality that

also paid little heed to their predecessors: Georgian Bath and Edinburgh, for example. Yetmany of these were urban extensions, rather than remodelling of existing built-up areas.

A broad knowledge of local and regional urban forms a larger scale than thevernacular architectural detail so often recommended and their analysis in terms ofidentifying those features that produce high-quality urban environments seems usefulin the light of much of the 20-century experience. A wider sensitivity to national andinternational comparisons can assist in this respect, although one could query whySiena and other Italian hill towns reappear uncritically in so many urban design texts.

In post-Enlightenment Western thought, concepts of originality and authenticityhave become significant, and this can be seen most particularly for urban designers interms of conservation its spread, and the growth of design guidance paying lip serviceto respect for original character and appearance. Again, can we learn from practice

elsewhere? The approach in Japan and other Eastern countries to respecting characterand design does not extend to veneration of the original fabric, while the urban traditionin the Near and Middle East has a very different approach to valuing and using traditionand authenticity.

THE NEED FOR A BROADER AND LONGER-TERM PERSPECTIVE

None of this detailed and broad knowledge will be of any use if it is disregarded at thehighest level of policy-making, and at the most contested level of implementation,through appeals and legal challenges, which rest upon quasi-judicial processes andinterpretations of the precise meaning of the words of statute and guidance. In creatinghigh-quality places, is a broad and long-term perspective on successful urban forms lessimportant than political guidance? Morphological detail can certainly fall at the hurdleof PPG3s density guidance. This is a major challenge for urban design: not in designingentire new towns, but in producing what can be widely accepted as high-quality designat the local level, in the re-shaping of the existing urban fabric, in identifying, retainingand reinforcing the best qualities of past urban forms, and in persuading owners andoccupiers of the rationale for, and quality of, new designs. Otherwise, the blunt tool of

guidance and the current official approach will fail to convince those who use and livein our new urban environments, and we may be designing and building the slums of thenext generation.

And, moreover, we should be learning from past forms. Birminghams new Bull Ringmay well be a vibrant and popular shopping destination but, as Joe Holyoak remindsus, it is too inflexible, too monocultural, too narrowly defined, too contained within itsown boundaries, to be an effective part of a city centre... In this, its makers are repeatingthe fundamental mistakes made by Laing in the 1960s, but this time on a bigger scale.

Let us put the lessons of urban history and urban form back into urban design, tohelp create the high-quality, vibrant, places we all know are needed.

Professor Peter Larkham is an urban geographer and is currently Director of Research for the School of Planning

and Housing, University of Central England.

Left Bullring, BirminghamRight City Centre Building Footprints

500 x 500m square


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Im driving down a calm subdivision roadin any American urbanised area (hardto call them cities, really). Sprawl has its

loveliness: the precise patterns of housesof similar size, surrounded by a patch oflawn, facing a street that may soon be linedwith trees. The space between houses isa regular rhythm, as is the curb cut andpavement of the driveway and even thedoors of the garages. Although we candemonise it, it is not hard to see whyAmericans adore their own little piece ofcastle, tucked into a neat, orderly plot.

But, lets keep driving, to the dirty littleaesthetic underbelly of the cosy suburb

the strip. All we need do is leave theshady acres sign in the rear view mirror,drive to the main road, and we encountera completely different world chaotic,charmless and without the redemptionof landscape or private domain. Here, novisible order prevails. Here is the hatedsymbol of sprawl, excess, corporate greedembodied in a world of shopping centres,fast food chains, downtrodden orientalbuffets, gas stations, signs, parking lots,and roads without benefit of a curb, muchless a tree.

A CANCER

Well, having studied it for years, I candescribe it the way a doctor might be ableto describe a cancer it has a definitiveform that is almost as predictable asthe quiet subdivisions around it. Its

form has subtly changed over the past 50 years since its earliestversions, but the elements are the same: single storey buildingsin a wide variety of sizes and shapes placed on lots with widely

varied lot widths and depths. All the buildings face one widestreet, although they may address it at an angle. Many lots havefront and back buildings, with the smaller ones in the frontonly slightly blocking the view to the rear shops. Parking lotsare everywhere, paving fills in almost every available surface,except for pathetic landscape islands. Signs dominate thearchitecture and the streetscape. The condition of the street istypically deplorable: weeds, trash, gravel, streetlights, curb cutsall signalling neglect.

THE CULPRITS

Who made this big mess? Although we universally deplore itwe cant seem to pin the blame on anyone at all. Sometimes itfeels like we cant even explain it, like a mysterious cancer thatjust appears along a previously uninfected country road. Its notlike we dont know any better, of course, we have new urbanistmodels of retail nodes, and even older existing neighbourhoodbusiness districts to help us visualise a different way thatcommercial and residential areas could work together.

Why dont we plan differently, even in circumstances wherewe have virgin farmland ready to be developed? Lets see if wecan make the blame for this mess stick to various suspects byimagining a country road ripe for development, right beforethe onslaught of sprawl. First, the planners zoned all the landalong the arterial for commercial use, with minimal setbacksand a height limit. The land NOT along the street was zonedexclusively for residentialmostly single family. Planners

assumed that the arterial, the major access route, would have toomuch traffic on it to comfortably accommodate residential uses,so commercial or institutional was their only option. Politically,they had to zone the entire street that way, even though it wouldtake a long time for it to develop continuous commercial activity.

WHO MADE THIS BIG MESS?Brenda Scheer tries to pin the blame for the morphologicaldisaster that is the American strip

Black and white clutter:competing signs, lackof sidewalks and unclearstreet edge typical of

commercial strips


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who will see the traffic as lifeblood for a business. The arterialhits a predetermined level of traffic and a McDonalds springs upand then a supermarket, and three drugstores, each an island toitself, built on a single piece of land that happens (by historicalaccident or by subdividing) to be the right size. Soon, largerstores are built, or a shopping centre with multiple tenants. Signsspin out of control. Traffic zooms, forcing the good people ofthe nearby subdivisions to curse as they take their only route tohome. The cancer has, inevitably, taken hold again.

RESISTANCE TO CHANGE

At every step along the way are legions of invisible forces andassumptions that move the process inexorably forward. Thereis a huge, national, built-in resistance that fights every changethat needs to be made in these areas to replan or redesign them ashumane places.

The land ownership pattern is one example. A simple look atthe land subdivision along the strip shows a fragmented patternof different sizes and shapes, the result of farms and housesalong the country road. This fragmented pattern originallyexisted in the nearby residential subdivisions, too, but land therehad to be aggregated and re-divided before roads and lots wereplanned, usually by a single actor. In the retail strip, there is nofundamental need for adjoining property owners to coordinate,much less to aggregate and subdivide. The variety of lots sizessuits a widely varying series of use types if you have a smalllot, you can build a gas station, with a larger lot, and you canhave a grocery store. There is no need to create orderly streetsand subdivisions, since the single arterial serves everyone bestbecause it carries all the lifeblood traffic.

Then there is planning, that is, the profession of planning inthe USA, which has a very limited set of standard tools. It is nolonger customary or possible to lay out a broad area with streetsand blocks that will be developed into new neighbourhoodsand town centres, unless you happen to own the entire areain question. Cities dont plan their own streets: residential

developers plan the subdivision layout (residential only)and highway engineers plan the arterial and larger system,usually based on the simple expansion of earlier farm roads.Planning for areas of fragmented ownership really involves twomajor regulatory games: zoning and residential subdivision

There is no need tocreate orderlystreets andsubdivisions, sincethe single arterial

serves everyone best

At the same time, planners gaveapproval to subdivisions that wereformally a series of dead end streets:400 families all forced to come and gothrough one or two intersections on thesingle arterial. Internal streets are eerilyquiet and calm without through traffic,just the way families want them. For thesake of protecting these family propertyvalues, no non-residential development isallowed, rarely even schools or churches,much less convenience stores.

The residential developers whoplanned the subdivision pulled housinglots hundreds of feet back from the mainroad because they thought the roadwould be a nuisance with so much trafficand commercial development on it.Their actions anticipate the high-trafficcommercial cancer, but they also serve tocreate it by insisting that all subdivisiontraffic be funnelled to the arterial ratherthan connecting neighbourhoods

with smaller streets. The arterial getsimmediately clogged with traffic.

Commercial developers take one lookat this traffic and see dollar signs. Theybegin to hunt down potential tenants,

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Left The typical big mess looks the same in everyAmerican suburb

Opposite page The disorderly, wildly scaledenvironment along the main arterial contrasts withorderly nearby subdivisions. Cincinnati, Ohio 1994

approval. Zoning has very minimal consequences for physicaldevelopment, mostly controlling land use (in America, aneconomic term rather than typological one) and setbacks orland cover. Subdivision approval depends on conformance withstandard street widths and utilities and rarely is the evaluationof the plan itself a question. While both of these could be used todevelop friendlier and better-designed areas, they usually are not.In any case, both are ill-fitted tools for urban design.

Current commercial types are another resistant force.

Todays stores are completely out of scale with the idealisedneighbourhood business district. Even the most minimalgrocery stores have a footprint that would overwhelm a walkingdistrict, which demands a comfortable distance between stores.Parking needs to be shoved to the back, so pedestrians can havea presence on the street with large and deep stores, customershave to enter from the rear (isnt this really just a backwards stripcentre?) or walk more than 100 feet from the edge of parkingalong the wall of a large store. Drive-in banks and fast food,gas stations, tire centres, auto dealers, and huge home centrestores also have no place in the idealized village because thesetypologies demand a car dominant culture.

The large size of stores and their consolidation intounrelenting corporate formulas is the result of economies ofscale, distribution systems and fierce competition. Of course thelarger commercial typologies are only the beginning - the largegrocery store eventually gives way to the super, mega, giga-store.When neighbourhood business districts were contained withinneighbourhoods, there were one or two of them occurring aboutevery square mile. Their catchment areas were small, and thescale of retail square footage was small, about 50-70,000 squarefeet altogether for many small stores. Traffic coming to and frowas neighbourhood traffic, some of it on foot, making it not a badnext-door neighbour, even for a single-family house. Now, thatamount of retail footage, much more efficiently laid out, can befound in a single large drug store, which naturally has to serve amuch larger catchment area, which means more people and more

traffic. Move up a scale to the super-centre, itself more than fourtimes the size of a single neighbourhood business district andpulling from many miles. Even more traffic and huge parking anddelivery systems make it a miserable neighbour, and it demands ahigh-volume street, not a little neighbourhood street.

The demand for retail locations withhigh volumes of traffic has gone handin hand with the development of thepattern of development in the suburbsthat funnels all local traffic in a sectorinto one arterial, by means of the lack ofconnection between subdivisions. Theresulting quiet streets of the housing arethus a contributor to the cancer itself.

It turns out to be much easier tomake the fundamental changes in theresidential fabric that new urbanismand smart growth advocates suggest(smaller lots, connected streets, alleyways,housing type mix) than to tackle theproblem of commercial strips. One caneven build small commercial villageswithin these idealised neighbourhoods,but these cannot displace the strip itself.Fundamental international distributionsystems, an entire real estate financeindustry, huge international corporations,an ingrained expectation about therole of planners, common real estatedevelopment typologies, and even the nicepeople on their cul-de-sacs will continueto overwhelm the ideal. The big mess willcontinue.

Brenda Scheer is the Dean of the College of

Architecture and Planning at the University of Utah.

She is a planner and an architect.

Parking needs to beshoved to the back,so pedestrians can

have a presence onthe street

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Above Regeneration of Queen Square Bristol Photo Bristol City CouncilRight View of St Thomas, RedcliffePhoto Bristol City CouncilFar right Worstall Crags Photo Countryside Agency - Simon Warner

There are obvious parallels between countryside characterassessment and the understanding of urban morphology intowns and cities. What ties the two processes together is the

broader concept of landscape. Landscape really exists as acontinuum across both rural and urban areas and can act afocus and catalyst for managing change. This paper provides abrief background to the agencys landscape character work andbegins to explore how the two processes might work together,to help inform the visioning, planning and design of moremultifunctional and sustainable environments, particularly atthe rural-urban fringe.

LANDSCAPE AS AN IDEA

Landscape is a term that is powerful because it invokes, in asingle word, a wide range of meanings1. Whilst landscape isoften associated in a countryside context, in a purest sense,landscape has no start or end points for me it is a concept thatdrives through and continues across the boundaries that maybe perceived to define urban and rural environments. Landscapeis a thing that means different things to different people. Andwhether you are strolling in the rolling hills of the mid-Devoncountryside or sat drinking coffee in Dam Square admiring thegreat sense of space, it is a concept that runs through all ourlives and contributes enormously to our quality of life. It is notjust the backdrop to our lives. Landscape can influence ourbehaviour, our values, our movement and over time fosters asense of belonging to a particular place rural, village, town orcity. Landscape is a concept you can build ideas around, use as acommon spatial reference point for discussion and a vehicle orspringboard for debate about future change.

The Countryside Agency takes an extensive andcomprehensive interpretation of landscape. This viewencompasses both natural and cultural aspects of land, seekingto understand how they interrelate and interact. Whilst ourwork is predominantly concerned with the landscapes of the

rural environment, the agency has a long history and a strongappreciation of landscape and the interconnections with largertowns and cities and how they function. For example, Englands

Community Forests over the past decade have been pioneeringand implementing the idea of multi-functional landscapes andbringing green infrastructure into the fringes and hearts ofurban areas. Community led village and town design statementsoriginated from a desire to extend and embed a landscapeapproach to the way development in smaller settlements areplanned and designed. Both initiatives have widely encouragedrural communities to use their local knowledge to describe howtheir settlements and building materials have been shaped andinfluenced by the landscape. Our Doorstep Greens initiative hasenabled many communities at the urban fringe to reinvigorateor create new spaces. We also have help to develop and promoteconcept statements2 a planning tool for helping to achievehigher quality development. More recently, we have beenengaging in and influencing the development of growth areasas part of the Governments Sustainable Communities Plan. Allthese have an underlying theme of landscape and landscapecharacter as the driving force behind them.

UNDERSTANDING LANDSCAPE CHARACTER

As individuals we often place higher value upon somelandscapes than others, owing to personal preferences or deepconnections to particular places. As a nation we express thesevalues formally through our decisions to designate nationallysignificant landscapes. But all landscapes have particularcharacteristics that differentiate them, and which give themunique identity and value. It is from this philosophy that the

countryside character approach and a national framework forfiner-grain landscape characterisation in England evolved in theearly 1990s. The former Countryside Commission joined withEnglish Nature and English Heritage to develop joint characterprofiles, which shaped the Character Map of England, and eight

LANDSCAPE AS A RURAL-URBAN CONTINUUMAndy Wharton describes the role of morphological analysis in the workof the Countryside Agency


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regional countryside character volumes3. This approach providesa systematic way of understanding all landscapes, not just thosedesignated for their national significance.

The process of characterisation allows landscapes to beunderstood, explained, and described in a transparent androbust way and can aid and inform policies and guidance forresource, planning, design and change management. Landscapecharacterisation conveys the multi-faceted and complex intricacyof landscape that is often hidden within visual appearance.Characterisation involves assessing the physical componentsof landscape alongside socio-economic and cultural influences.It also works with the way landscapes change over time,acknowledging the changing influences of peoples activities andthe implications of economic development. The key strengthof landscape character assessment4 is the way it objectivelydisaggregates aspects of landscape that when put together wedescribe as overall character.

Landscape characterisation is also a vital foundation inthe visioning, planning and sustainable development ofcommunities and the landscapes in which they live. Of particularvalue is the way it allows for the integration of a wide rangeof objectively observed data in holistic statements about alllandscapes: only by having a holistic overview of the characterand function of landscapes can we develop tailored policies andactions for management and development that accurately reflectour aspirations and priorities.

A LANDSCAPE CONTINUUM?

Urban morphological analysis and the methodology of landscapecharacterisation in many ways share much in common.

Both are concerned with assessing and understanding form,function, cultural influences and time-depth (an appreciationof the historical influences that has shaped the land or builtenvironment). Whilst the language used to describe componentsand their spatial arrangement may slightly differ, both processes

are essentially trying to understand and pinpoint how a ruralor urban landscape, space, settlement or street has evolved andwhat defines its key characteristics and strengths. Both canprovide a baseline of evidence or statement of current characterand condition and both are usually undertaken as a precursor todeveloping policies, strategies, action plans or design principlesfor the future development, conservation or management of anarea or neighbourhood.

Both processes are concerned with the idea of landscape

as a medium for guiding future action. The holistic or broadlandscape idea is one that recognises that different rural andurban landscapes and characteristics exist because of the inter-relationship and interconnection between social, economicand environmental factors. By looking at this from anotherperspective; landscape should be expressed as the commonthread or glue that helps to integrate social, economic andenvironment needs together, at the same time.

IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF THE RURAL-URBAN FRINGE

Earlier this year the Countryside Agency and Groundworklaunched a consultation vision statement for the rural-urbanfringe5. The crux of the vision is based upon the principle ofachieving landscape multi-functionality and using the existingstatutory planning frameworks to help coordinate, implementand deliver the vision.

Across the country rural and urban local authorities and localstrategic partnerships are busy preparing their local developmentframeworks and community strategies. Local developmentframeworks, replacing local development plans, are meant toset out the spatial planning dimension of community strategies.Community strategies provide the overarching communityvision for the area the two need be intrinsically linked, but how?Whilst most community strategies will include chapters on thegreen environment, very few appear to delve further into visionsand objectives for rural and urban landscapes. Perhaps a greaterinclusion of the broad concept of landscape in rural and urban

areas within community strategies could provide the necessaryspatial hook that local development frameworks can drawinspiration and direction from.

This approach could be particularly effective in the rural-urban fringe, where landscape character assessment and urbanmorphological analysis can be applied in tandem to help convertthe rather nebulous broad landscape concept into a clearer,more objective language, understood by communities, andsubsequently used to inform and shape area action plans forconservation or change. Whilst not groundbreaking in itself,the process of engaging people and raising awareness of theirrural-urban fringe landscapes at the community strategy levelcould serve to bring about a wider appreciation of how theimprovement and success of the landscape environment is avital component to a better quality of life and to the achievementof sustainable development.

Andy Wharton, Positive Planning team, Living Landscapes, The Countryside Agency

REFERENCES1. E Penning-Rowsell and D Lowenthal (eds): Landscape

Meanings and Values. Allen & Unwin, London, 19862. Concept statements and Local Development Documents Practical guidance for

local planning authorities CA149, The Countryside Agency, Cheltenham, 20033. Countryside Character Regional Reports, Volumes 1-8,

Countryside Commission, Cheltenham, 1997-19994. Landscape Character Assessment: Guidance for England and Scotland,

Countryside Agency/Scottish Natural Heritage, 20025. Unlocking the potential of the rural-urban fringe, Consultation document,

The Countryside Agency & Groundwork, Cheltenham, 2004

All landscapeshave particularcharacteristicsthat differentiatethem, and which

give them uniqueidentity and value


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VARIOUS APPROACHESWith this renewed interest in urban history, the concept of building type becamedeeply rooted in the past, even if its character and meaning seemed to change withthe methodological interpretation of the different authors involved. For GianfrancoCaniggia1, one of the most notable, along with the wider Muratorian school, thebuilding type was to be considered a collective project, the result of widely sharedcultural values deeply rooted in local traditions. In addition it was conceived as thetemporary result of a never-ending process of transformation of existing buildings,progressively updated to new social and technical needs, leading to a dense andstrongly layered architecture, a view abandoned by the abstract approach of theModern Movement. To an extent, Giulio Carlo Argan2 and Pier Luigi Cervellati3accepted Caniggias point of view, recognising the historical process implicit in thebuilding type. But once it was applied, for example, in the plan for Bolognas historiccentre, they denied the possibility of using it as the starting point for more complexarrangements derived from a systematic transformation of previous types.

Aldo Rossi4, on the contrary, aimed at joining traditional urban form with thattheorised by international Rationalism. According to him the building type wasconceived as a constant and archetypal configuration which persists throughspace and time as a design tool. Consequently architecture became the historicalinterpretation of its permanence and stability. While the hypotheses expressed byCaniggia and Argan were mainly applied to conservation programmes in historicalcentres, that proposed by Rossi and further developed by, among the others, CarloAymonino, Guido Canella and Gian Ugo Polesello, was taken as a reference pointfor new urban developments over the 70s and the 80s. This led progressively tothe identification of the building type, in the Italian debate, as a matter that seemedunchangeable and independent of the different methods used.

The ideological framework inherited from the debate over historical centres was

not, however, homogeneous. Caniggia, Argan and Cervellati believed in the city asa unique and organic totality, on which time acted according to recurrent laws. Thedevelopment of urban form is characterised by the dialectic between residentialareas and institutional building, expressions of the same typological substance.Rossi, on the contrary, assumed the city is a sort of patchwork made of differentfeatures, called the citt per parti, obtained by progressively adding new parts to thealready existing ones, which altered the meaning of the city by changing its previousconfiguration. In addition he distinguished the behaviour of institutional buildings,called elementi primari from that of ordinary buildings, the aree residenza. Whilethe former reveal formal stability, the latter undergo continuous transformationproducing informal but not comparable arrangements. Both views do, however,admit that the city is, and had always been, the result of the dialectic betweencentres and peripheries and reveal a close relationship between urban morphologyand building typology. This statement, in fact, could be simultaneously confirmed bythe development of the traditional and the modern city.

But the transition from the industrial to the post-industrial economy has entirelymodified this framework and urban design practice in the 1990s was quick to recordnew urban phenomena. In Italy, Bernardo Secchi5 was the first to theorise the conceptof citt diffusa (urban sprawl). According to him we have to replace the idea ofthe modern metropolis with that of a totally discontinuous urbanised territory.Paradoxically, the Russian disurbanistic avant-guarde proposals - to bring urbanityinto the countryside and blur the traditional distinction between the city and the openlandscape - was not realised by the socialist economy, but by the emerging capitalistsystem. The massive improvement of territorial infrastructure, intended to enhancethe efficiency of goods transport around an ever larger commercial market, hasresulted in the almost uniform diffusion across the territory of the ordinary buildingsnecessary for production and trading, with an attendant change in their dimensions

and mutual interrelations. This phenomenon has further led the spontaneousbackbone to settle into unexpected locations, both residential areas and centres ofleisure activity, which continue to transform the same concept of urban living. Theaverage scale of these new settlements is totally different in comparison to traditionaland modern ones and proportional in size to the global economy.

THE ITALIAN APPROACH: PREMISES,DEVELOPMENTS AND PROSPECTSNicola Marzot discusses the importance of building type inurban design practice

In Italy, the application of the concept ofbuilding type in urban design practicehas been systematically affected by theoverwhelming importance placed onthe culture of historic centres. From its

theoretical inception in the early 1960s,morphogenetic analysis of the historiccore was used as a source of designguidance helpful to current practice.The aim was to draw a contrast withthe lack of urbanity of peripheral areasproduced by applying the principles of theModern Movement: functional zoning;social segregation by role and income;low densities; universal building types;dissolution of both traditional patterns ofpublic space and structural relations withthe existing urban settlement.

As opposed to the anonymousuniformity induced by the widespreadindustrial interpretation of urbanmorphology, the notion of the geniusloci was seized as a basis for summarisinga commonly shared aspiration to newideals: a strong integration of differentfunctions and social classes; highdensity to avoid wasteful use of landand to intensify individual relations; thecreation of continuous urban blocks bymutual arrangement of building types;the recovery of a close relation betweenbuilding features and urban voids; the

reuse and transformation of existingtypes, updating them to accommodatenew needs, and more attention in generalfocused on deriving operative suggestionsfor new building features from the past.


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In this new framework, the concept of building type is nolonger capable of meeting new needs, mainly expressed by the

generic city, theorised by Rem Koolhaas6. The main cause seemsto be the desire for flexibility and continuous transformationexpressed by the new economy. The hierarchical structureof the city has been replaced by a network of centres locatedinto the most profitable nodes within it, in order to intensifyand multiply mutual connection. Because the configurationsof the net-city are always changing in close relation to thedevelopment of the market, the buildings are as anonymousas possible and tend to isolate each other in order to freely andrapidly meet new needs. Once again, as with functionalism,the architecture refuses to be representative of shared values,making itself a matter of language, and aiming to offer itselfsimply as a working tool for programmatic purposes.

If and when architecture aspires to express contemporaryvalues in urban design practice, we notice recurrent strategies:to blur into infrastructural iconicity, emphasising the roleof mobility in current urban culture; to create of an artificiallandscape merged into the natural one, expressing the endlesswidening of the traditional city boundaries; to compete withurban centres and become a self-sufficient small town, artificiallyreplacing the scale of traditional patterns of public space, erasedby urban sprawl. By admitting only a partial focus on reality,all of these, however, inevitably avoid the complexity of thecurrent urban landscape where traditional urban nuclei, modernperipheries, fragments of productive farmland, territorialinfrastructures, productive settlements and wastelands coexistclose to each other to produce something which, in its entirety,

reminds us of the idea of a collage city, as defined by Colin Roweand Fred Koetter7, even if shown at a wider scale than the original.

This realistic framework opens up new perspectives to thepossible application of the concept of building type in urbandesign strategies. The global economy has in fact accelerated the

perception of differences as a matter of identity for the new city,bringing together into a new kind of unity territorial features

which previously belonged to autonomous scales and purposes.It therefore no longer seems possible to define a unique solutionand to pursue an ideological approach to the new urbanisedterritories. On the contrary it seems helpful for design practiceto work on specific fragments. Every single urban feature shouldtherefore be viewed according to its inner logic, implying asystematic deconstruction of its principles which are individualand cannot be generalised. This approach will inevitably leadus to recognise the internal differences which lie at the heart ofevery single feature and accept them as the conscious result of achoice, showing the historical heterogeneity of the city centres,the modern periphery, the rural landscape, the productivesettlement and the net-city itself8 and confirming the strongrelationship between urban morphology and building typologyin a weak but important way.

Nicola Marzot is an architect teaching in the Faculty of Architecture at the

University of Ferrara and on the editorial board of Paesaggio Urbano.

REFERENCE1. Caniggia Gianfranco, Maffei Gian Luigi, Lettura

delledilizia di base, Venezia, Marsilio Editori, 19792. Argan Giulio Carlo, Progetto e destino, Milano, Il Saggiatore, 19653. Cervellati Pier Luigi (edited by), La nuova cultura

della citt, Milano, Mondadori, 19774. Rossi Aldo, Larchitettura della citt, Padova, Marsilio Editori, 19665. Secchi Bernardo, Un progetto per lurbanistica, Torino, Einaudi, 19896. Koolhaas Rem, S,M,L,XL, New York, The Monacelli Press, 19957. Rowe Colin, Koetter Fred, Collage City, Cambridge,

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1978

8. This work of research is already started in Italy. The previous resultscan be found in Marzot Nicola, The paradox of Castel Maggiore. APlanned city without any prescription about urban form, in PetruccioliAttilio, Stella Michele, Strappa Giuseppe (edited by), The Planned city?,Bari, Uniongrafica Corticelli Editrice, 2003, Volume I, pp 159-165

Opposite page Carlo Aymonino, ROMA-EST proposal forthe XV Milans Triennale, 1973. The citt per particoncept as an analytical method and project model:the city is defined as a bricolage of well knownarchitecture.

Above Hans Kollhoff, project for an analogous city, 1976.A collage of well known architectural typology isassumed as a possible model for redefining the modernurban space.

Left A proposal of the netcity, 1988: OMA/RemKoolhaas first sketches for Euralille, the new city as anarrangement of autonomous fragments.

Every single urban featureshould therefore be viewedaccording to its inner logic


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Space syntax is a way of researching cities to understand howsocial and economic processes shape space over time. To use thecurrent jargon, it is a way of looking at cities as self-organising

systems.The best-known aspect of space syntax is probably its set of

methods for analysing patterns of space or spatial configuration in the built environment. These methods both uncover spatialstructures in cities and relate them to the way people move, stop,and interact. Space syntax methods also help project the mid- andlong-term effects of design and planning decisions, and thereforeallow designers and planners to work with social and economicprocesses rather than against them.

A number of these methods have been successfully used forsome time, including axial analysis, (for analysing the network ofstreets and walkways cities) and visibility graph analysis or VGA(for analysing patterns of visual fields in public spaces). However,new types of analysis are constantly emerging from the work ofthe Space Syntax Laboratory, University College London, and itscommercial partner, Space Syntax Limited. This article brieflydescribes some of those developments.

COMPLEMENTING CONFIGURATION: THE WALKABILITY INDEX

To hold that spatial configuration strongly influences movement,as space syntax theory does, is not to say that configurationdetermines everything about movement or that its effectsare equally powerful in all places. In some cases, the effectof configuration is weaker than in others, so that additionalinformation is required before movement patterns can beunderstood or the outcomes of design decisions forecast. Thisadditional information is related to such factors as transport

nodes, land use, building frontage, infrastructural elements,major attractors or generators, and aesthetic features.

These other factors can now be linked to configurationalmodels through a recently developed technique known asthe Walkability Index. The Walkability Index is based on the

statistical methodology of multiple regression analysis, or MRA.MRA methods empirically analyse data in order to determinethe impact of each factor serving as an input variable to the

movement model. MRA models can provide insight on questionsrelating to pedestrian movement patterns by highlighting therelative importance of, for example, local integration (the keyconfigurational measure for influencing movement) comparedto building height, transport nodes or active frontages.

Also, changing the value of different input variables suchas those relating to the width of a walkway, for example,or the amount of active frontage can help in forecastingthe movement patterns that would likely result. In fact,combinations of factors can be analysed and modified, allowingfor a robust methodology.

The Walkability Index is particularly useful in areaswhere insensitive intervention has put spatial configuration,movement and land use out of sync, such as at the Elephant& Castle in London (the evolving masterplan for which isgreatly informed by space syntax analysis). In fact, the need fora technique like this serves as a reminder that the agreementbetween grid configuration, movement, and land use is theproduct of the well-formed city, where all three have evolvedtogether. It is probably the main reason why traditional citiesare admired as much as they are. This does not mean that citiesmust be designed in the same way they were in the past, but itdoes mean they should be designed in the light of what is knownabout the ways in which collections of buildings and other urbanelements can become living cities.

CONFIGURATION AT A FINER SCALE: SEGMENT ANALYSIS

One of the great advantages of space syntax is that it analysesspace at the micro and macro scale of the city at once. For sometime, the line has been the main unit of urban analysis (reflectingthe simple fact that city space is essentially a network of linearspaces). However, it is not the finest scale that we need to

NEW METHODS IN SPACE SYNTAXBill Hillier and Chris Stutz recount the latest developmentsin their research

Left Site in Milan showing spatial agent analysis.Spaces are represented on a colour scale accordingto the number of times they were traversed bymoving virtual agents during the analysis: most inred and least in blue.

Above Central London area: degree to which eachsegment of street lies on least-angle-change routesfrom all points to all others. Segments in red arepart of the most routes, segments in blue part ofthe least.


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TOPICunderstand, as the different segments of lines between junctions

often work rather differently. It is also important to take accountof the fact that different cities have very different geometricalpatterns, varying from the more grid-like to the more organic.

To deal with all of these issues, a new syntactic model hasbeen developed. It is still based on the line network, but itsbasic unit is the line segment between junctions. This not onlyallows a much finer scale of configurational analysis, but alsomakes possible different types of analyses based on different

ways of defining the distance between one segment and another:metric distance (how far is it from point A to point B?), fewestturns distance (how many turns does the route require, so howcomplex does it seem?) and least angle distance (how muchturning does the route require in terms of total deflection from astraight line?). These different analyses capture different ways ofrepresenting urban complexity.

Research using this new model is ongoing, but it is alreadyproving powerful in the analysis of changing land use patternsat the most micro-scale of the city. The model is being used todevelop movement models that work at a finer scale than line-based analysis, and it is also helping to illuminate the role thatmetric, geometric and topological factors play in the way that thenetwork of city space itself shapes movement. Important newresults in this area will be announced in the near future andthey may come as a surprise to some.

INTERNALISING CONFIGURATION: SPATIAL AGENTS

The final development to be described here EVAS spatial agents evolved from the VGA methods used on many public spaceprojects, including the recent redesign of Trafalgar Square.

EVAS creates virtual environments (based on maps orarchitectural drawings) and then populates them with virtualpedestrian agents who have a limited form of forward-facingvision. As these agents move around, they use perception-actionrules to dictate their movement behaviour for example, theycan be attracted by specific objects that come into their field of

view. If the environment changes (to simulate a new design, forexample), EVAS demonstrates how the patterns of movementmight change in response. The decision rules themselves can alsobe modified and tested.

Although other agent-based modelling techniques have beenaround for some time, none have attempted exactly what EVASdoes. In truth, most have a similar general aim: to simulatecomplex social processes that are difficult, costly, or simplyimpossible to observe directly. In addition, there are severalagent-based technologies presently in use that model humanmovement. However, these techniques tend to focus on eitherthe macrodynamics of population movement, or, at the otherextreme, the microdynamics of very specific scenarios, such asescaping a fire or behaviour within a crowd.

Virtually no models consider free-will behaviour in urbanareas or large public buildings. Agent modelling in suchscenarios has largely been avoided because, at these intermediatelevels, what people can see on a journey plays an important rolein what they do, and endowing agents with vision can be verycomputationally taxing.

EVAS overcomes this technical limitation by using the VGAtechnique of pre-computing what can be seen from any givenlocation within an environment. When it comes to runningagents through the model, they simply consult a database andretrieve the information about what they can see from thelocation they currently occupy. This allows rapid simulationof complex environments where computation times would

otherwise be prohibitive.As mentioned above, the Walkability Index seems to clearly

indicate that the locations and densities of land uses have an effecton movement, but these in turn can be shown to be systematicallyrelated to configuration. Agent simulations allow more precise

investigation of how all these factors interact. At the same time, itrepresents an attempt to get closer to the individual experience ofusing space, specifically targeting the old problem of whether human

movement is more influenced by configuration or attraction.

SUMMARY

This account of recent space syntax work should illustrate someof the interesting and powerful new capabilities that are beingdeveloped.

Space syntax has never been merely a set of techniques forsolving design problems. Instead, it is a way of researching therelationship between the way cities are structured and the waythey function. It has a long history of highlighting culturaldifferences between cities, but increasingly it is able to identifywhat cities have in common and so it is helping to build a moregeneral theory of the city, one that especially illuminates therelation between micro and macro scales.

Whether acknowledged or not, urban design is alwaysinfluenced by how planners and designers understand cities ona theoretical level. The most important aspect of cities is thatthey are always to some degree self-organising. Space syntaxcontributes to an understanding of how cities evolve naturally,an understanding upon which future planning and urban design

will depend.

Bill Hillier is a professor at the Bartlett, UCL, and a director of Space Syntax

Limited. Chris Stutz is an associate director of Space Syntax Limited. The authors

would like to acknowledge the help of Alan Penn, Alasdair Turner, Noah Raford, Tim

Stonor and Alain Chiaradia in preparing this article.

Space syntax has never beenmerely a set of techniques forsolving design problems

Above top Significant factors influencing pedestrian movement in the area aroundHarrods in Knightsbridge as identified by the Walkability Index.

Above Pedestrian movement forecast map of same area with proposed new linkbetween Knightsbridge and Hyde Park, incorporating likely effects of layout/configuration and other significant factors. Forecast levels for each segment arerepresented on a colour scale, highest levels red and lowest levels blue.