THEORIES & IDEAS

THAT
HAVESHAPED/SHAPING

CITIES

Dissertation Guide: Dissertation By:

Dr. Minakshi Jain Nishant Sharma
National Institute of Technology, Hamirpur
 TABLE OF CONTENTS (Chronological Order)
State of World Cities Urban Models
Historic Planning Theories 1. Neighbourhood Unit
2. Concentric Zone Model
1. Engineering Liveable Cities
3. Sector Model and Multiple Nuclei Model
2. Landscape tradition
3. Garden City Modern Planning Theories

4. City Beautiful 1. Landscape Urbanism

2. New Urbanism
5. Regional Planning 3. Intelligent Urbanism
6. Cities in the Park 4. Tactical Urbanism
7. Urban Renewal 5. Biophilic/ Green urbanism
6. Walkable Cities
8. Legibility and Imageability 7. Parametric Urbanism
9. Bottom-Up Design
Shanghai London Paris

Dubai

Panama City

Urban Transformation
State of the Worlds Cities [Source: UN Habitat, World Bank report (2015)]
The world is inexorably becoming urban.
By 2030 all developing regions, including Asia and Africa, will have more
people living in urban than rural areas.
In the next 20 years, Homo sapiens, the wise human, will become Homo
sapiens urbanus in virtually all regions of the planet
Cities are constantly changing
They are built, rebuilt, transformed, occupied by different groups, and used
for different functions
By the mid-20th century, 3 out of 10 people on the planet lived in urban
areas
Today, half the worlds population lives in urban areas and by the middle of
this century all regions will be predominantly urban, with the tipping point in
Eastern Africa anticipated slightly after 2050.
According to current projections, virtually the whole of the worlds
population growth over the next 30 years will be concentrated in urban
areas.
State of the Worlds Cities

Above: Global Population growth per Continent from 1750-2005 Above: Global urbanization map showing the percentage of urbanization per
country in 2012
State of the Worlds Cities [Source: UN Habitat, World Bank report (2015)]
Urbanization became more rapid as globalization spread industry and
technology to all corners of the world. For example, whereas London took
roughly 130 years to grow from 1 to 8 million people, Bangkok took 45 years,
and Seoul took only 25 years. Globally, urban growth was at its peak during
the 1950s, with a population expansion of more than 3% per year
o The first, or old, Industrial Revolution took place between about
1750 and 1870
Took place in England, the United States, Belgium, and France
Saw fundamental changes in agriculture, the development of factories, and
rural-to-urban migration
o The second Industrial Revolution took place between about 1870
and 1960
Saw the spread of the Industrial Revolution to places such as Germany,
Japan, and Russia
Electricity became the primary source of power for factories, farms, and
homes
Mass production, particularly of consumer goods Use of electrical power
saw electronics enter the marketplace (electric lights, radios, fans, television
sets)
There is no planning practice without a theory
about how it ought to be practiced.
That theory may or may not be named or
present in consciousness, but it is there all the
time.
John Friedmann
 HISTORIC
PLANNING
THEORIES
Engineering Liveable Cities

Early city streets were dirt, always reeking

with waste and garbage in standing water;
during middle of Nineteenth century cities
experimented with pavements of wooden
blocks, cobblestones, macadam and asphalt.
Taken together, these efforts to design and
construct urban infrastructure had powerful
effects in shaping erstwhile cities.
Municipal Engineers who managed public
works projects: Water supply, sewers,
streets, bridges, park facilities- were the first
city planners ( along with Landscape
Architects and Park Designers) who were
first to think about future patterns of growth
 1820 s

The Landscape Tradition

the enjoyment of scenery employs the mind without fatigue and yet
exercises it, tranquilizes it and yet enlivens it; and thus, through the
influence of the mind over the body, gives the effect of refreshing rest
and reinvigoration to the whole system.
-Frederick Law Olmsted, 1865
The Landscape Tradition, Nineteenth Century

Pioneered by Fredrick Law Olmsted

First American theory of Urban planning
Incorporation of parks and natural
landscapes into Urban fabric
High value on nature
Imaginative use of landscape design could
relieve the stress of crowded cities
Pivotal figure in evolution of suburbs
planned in Romantic or Picturesque
style
He used long curving meadows, irregular Landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted designed some of
Americas most well-known green spaces, including Central Park, a
lakes and winding pathways to create the green oasis in the middle of busy Manhattan
feeling of country in the city
The Landscape Tradition, Nineteenth Century

Planned Suburbs
Classical Model of Sub Urban
Neighbourhood was Olmsteds 1868
design for riverside, Illinois
The goal was a pastoral landscape in
which streets, walkways, and trees
created secluded peacefulness and
tranquillity
Design elements of romantic suburbs
overlapping with more socially conscious
goal of the Garden City Movement
Exclusive residential development
with tasteful provision of retail
facilities, schools and churches
flourished in the late nineteenth
century
Above: The master plan of suburb Riverside designed by F L Olmsted
 1850

Garden City
Whatever may have been the causes which have operated in the past,
and are operating now, to draw the people into the cities, those causes
may all be summed up as "attractions
-Ebnezer Howard, Garden cities of Tomorrow
The city in the Garden
Garden City most potent planning model in Western
urban planning
Created by Ebenezer Howard in 1898 to solve urban
and rural problems
Source of many key planning ideas during 20th
century
Garden City an impressive diagram of THE THREE
MAGNETS namely the town magnet, country
magnet with their advantages and disadvantages
and the third magnet with attractive features of
both town and country life.
Proposal for radical deconcentration of industrial
cities
Network of self sufficient satellite towns
Naturally people preferred the third one namely
Garden City
The city in the Garden
Core garden city principles
o Strong community
o Ordered development
o Environmental quality
These were to be achieved by:
o Unified ownership of land to prevent individual
land speculation and maximise community benefit
o Careful planning to provide generous living and
working space while maintaining natural qualities
o Social mix and good community facilities
o Limits to growth of each garden city
o Local participation in decisions about development
 1890

City Beautiful Movement

Make no little plans. They have no magic to
stir mens blood and probably themselves will
not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in
hope and work. Daniel Burnham
City Beautiful Movement
The City Beautiful movement was a reaction to the rapid,
ferocious and unplanned growth of American cities in the
modern industrial era after the Civil War.
Those towns and cities were dirty, crowded, polluted,
crime-ridden places and they were ugly.
Little thought was given to beauty when there was money
to be made.
flourished during the 1890s and 1900s with the intent of
introducing beautification and monumental grandeur in
cities
Daniel Burnham, a Chicago architect, began to address
these issues.
City Beautiful was characterized by the belief that if you
improved form, function would follow. In other words, an
attractive city would perform better than an unattractive
one.
Beauty came from what Burnham called municipal art .
 1915

Regional Planning
It takes a whole region to make a city.
Patrick Geddes, Cities in Evolution(1915)
REGIONAL PLANNING
Patrick Geddes introduced the concept of
"region" to architecture and planning and coined
the term "conurbation( Cities in evolution)
Geddes saw the city as a superstructure , built
as a formwork developed by place, work and
folk.
Geddes championed a mode of planning that
sought to consider primary human needs in
every intervention, engaging in constructive and
conservative surgery
His theories became realized between the late
1940s to 1950s.
The idea that planning cant just happen within a Patrick Geddes, Valley Section, 1909,
city, but instead within a region or in this case
within the country, was cemented.
REGIONAL PLANNING
Bioregionalism and Ecological Responsible Design
In The City in History , Lewis Mumford ,1962 U.S. National
Book Award for Nonfiction In his book The Condition of Man, published
in 1944
In this influential book Mumford explored the development
of urban civilizations
Harshly critical of urban sprawl
BIOTECHNICS
some of the earliest and finest thinking on bioregionalism, Mumford did not believe it was
anti-nuclearism, biodiversity, alternate energy paths, necessary for bioviability to collapse
ecological urban planning and appropriate technology as technics advanced, however,
because he held it was possible to
Mumford believed that what defined humanity, what set create technologies that functioned
human beings apart from other animals, was not primarily in an ecologically responsible
our use of tools (technology) but our use of language manner, and he called that sort of
(symbols) technology biotechnics.
Mumford was deeply concerned with the relationship
between technics and bioviability
REGIONAL PLANNING
Ian McHarg (1920-1981), the Father of GIS
He wrote Design with Nature in 1969
McHarg saw industrial centers as urban plight, filled
with pollution that ultimately damaged ones soul as
well as health
Above: McHargs starting point was usually a physiographic
He argued that form must not follow function, but section. Note the placement of structures in the forested
must also respect the natural environment in which slopes which made them almost unnoticeable
it is placed environment in which it is placed.
McHarg took landscape principles of aesthetics and Left: McHarg usually
applied these to maps began with a
Physiographic
Earth sheltered structures could be constructed on Features Map. This
the slopes if they were embedded into the rock with example compared
a minimal loss of tree cover. Hence the term urban forest cover, aquifer
camouflage, or designing with nature recharge, 50-yr flood
plain, streams,
slopes >25% and
impervious soils in a
master overlay
 1920
Cities in the Park
A metropolitan economy, if it is working well,
is constantly transforming many poor people
into middleclass people, many illiterates into
skilled people, many greenhorns into competent
citizens...Cities dont lure the middle class. They
create it.
- Jane Jacobs, Life and Death of Great American Cities
 CITIES in the PARK
People Centric Approach
Jane Jacobs approached cities as living beings and
ecosystems. She suggested that over time, buildings,
streets and neighbourhoods function as dynamic
organisms, changing in response to how people interact
with them.
She explained how each element of a city sidewalks,
parks, neighbourhoods, government, economy
functions together, in the same manner as the natural
ecosystem. This understanding helps us discern how
cities work, how they break down, and how they could
be better structured.
Although orthodox planning theory had blamed high
density for crime, filth, and a host of other problems,
Jacobs disproved these assumptions and demonstrated
how a high concentration of people is vital for city life,
economic growth, and prosperity.
 1940

Urban Renewal
I raise my stein to the builder who can remove
ghettos without removing people as I hail the chef
who can make omelettes without breaking eggs.
Robert Moses
 URBAN RENEWAL
Renovation and Infrastructure Development
It is a form of land redevelopment that was used in
blighted, moderate to high-density, urban areas.
Urban renewal involves the relocation of businesses,
the demolition of structures, the relocation of people
and the use of eminent domain (government purchase
of property for public purpose) as a legal instrument to
take private property for city-initiated development
projects.
Proponents have seen urban renewal as a tool for
economic growth and a reform mechanism, and by
critics as a mechanism for control. It may enhance
existing communities, and in some cases result in the
demolition of neighbourhoods.
Many cities link the revitalization of the central
business district and gentrification of residential
neighbourhoods to earlier urban renewal programs.
 1952

Bottom Up Place Design

What attracts people most,
it would appear, is other people.
William Whyte, (The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces),1980
BOTTOM-UP PLACE DESIGN
William Whyte (City: Rediscovering the Center)
believed that the social life in public spaces
contributes fundamentally to the quality of life of
individuals and society as a whole.
He believed that we have a moral responsibility to
create physical places that facilitate civic
engagement and community interaction.
Whyte advocated for a new way of designing public
spaces one that was bottom-up, not top-down.
Using his approach, design should start with a
thorough understanding of the way people use
spaces and the way they would like to use spaces.
Whyte noted that people vote with their feet they
use spaces that are easy to use, that are
comfortable. They dont use the spaces that are not.
By observing and by talking to people, Whyte
believed, we can learn a great deal about what
people want in public spaces and can put this
knowledge to work in creating places that shape
liveable communities.
 1960

Legibility and Imageability

Not only is the city an object which is perceived
(and perhaps enjoyed) by millions of people of
widely diverse class and character, but it is the
product of many builders who are constantly
modifying the structure for reasons of their own.
Kevin Lynch
Legibility and Imageability
The legibility of a place is essentially the ease with which
people understand the layout of a place. By introducing this
idea, Lynch was able to isolate distinct features of a city, and
see what specifically is making it so vibrant, and attractive to
people.
The city contains many unique elements, which are defined
as a network of paths, edges, districts, nodes and landmarks.
 1960

PlaceMaking
First life, then spaces, then buildings the other way
around never works -Jan Gehl
Placemaking
Place makeing are works of public art and design that
capture or reinforce the unique character of a site or
space.
"Placemaking is the way in which all human beings
transform the places they find themselves into the
places where they live.-Lynda H. Schneekloth
Placemaking capitalizes on a local community's assets,
inspiration, and potential, with the intention of creating
public spaces that promote people's health,
happiness, and well being. It is political due to the
nature of place identity
The concepts behind placemaking originated in the
1960s, when writers like Jane Jacobs and William H.
Whyte offered groundbreaking ideas about designing
cities that catered to people, not just to cars and
shopping centers
Urban Models
 Neighborhood Unit, 1920

Clarence Perry was an early promoter of

neighbourhood community and recreation centres
(Neighbourhood Unit, a Scheme for Arrangement
for the Family- Life Community)
Clarence Steins work expanded the idea of a
Garden City

A diagram showing the street

network structure of Radburn and its
nested hierarchy. Separate pedestrian
paths run through the green spaces
between the culs-de-sac and through
the central
green spine
Concentric zone model,1925
Commuter zone
In The City (Park, Burgess, & McKenzie,
1925) they conceptualized the city into the
Residential zone
concentric zones (Concentric zone model)
o central business district, Working class zone
o transitional (industrial, deteriorating
housing), working-class residential
Zone of transition
(tenements) Factory zone
o residential CBD
o commuter/suburban zone

They also viewed cities as something that

experiences evolution and change, in the
Darwinian sense.
Models: Sectors (Hoyt) ,Multiple nuclei model (Harris and Ullman)

1945 article "The Nature of Cities" Sector Multi centres

Goals 2 3 3
Move away from the concentric zone
4 1
model 2
To better reflect the complex nature 3
3 5
of urban areas, especially those of 3 4
1 3 3 7
larger size 5
3
Effects 6
3 4
As multiple nuclei develop, 2
transportation hubs such as 9 8
airports are constructed
These transportation hubs have
negative externalities such as noise 1 CBD 6 Heavy manufacturing
pollution and lower land values, 2 Wholesale and light manufacturing 7 Sub business district
3 Low-class residential 8 Residential suburb
making land around the hub cheaper. 4 Middle-class residential 9 Industrial suburb
5 High-class residential
MODERN PLANNING IDEAS
 1990

Landscape Urbanism
The city of the future will be an infinite series of landscapes:
psychological and physical, urban and rural, flowing apart
and together.
Christopher Alexander was right: a city is not a tree. It is a
landscape.
Tom Turner, 1996
Landscape Urbanism
Theory of urban planning arguing that
the best way to organize cities is
through the design of the citys
landscape, rather than the design of
its buildings.
The phrase 'landscape urbanism' first
appeared in the work of Peter
Connolly, RMIT Melbourne
James Corner is the author of an essay
entitled Terra Fluxus. He has
identified four general ideas that are
important for use in Landscape
Urbanism
o Process over time
o Horizontality
o Working Methods /Techniques
o The imaginary
Landscape Urbanism
Criticism
A true merger of landscape architecture with the field of Urban Ecology
lacks
From this criticism Frederick Steiner introduced landscape ecological
urbanism as an approach that can include the field of urban ecology
One opponent to Landscape Urbanism is New Urbanism, which
promotes walkable communities and smart growth with its Transit
Oriented Development (TOD) and Traditional Neighbourhood Design
(TND). In response to landscape urbanisms focus on expansive green
space in urban development, Duany stated that density and urbanism
are not the same. Further, unless there is tremendous density, human
beings will not walk.
Emo Urbanism is another philosophy critical of Landscape Urbanism. The
movement contends that Landscape Urbanism views ecology as an
aesthetic element of style and not urban ecology. (Ian Thompson (2012)
Ten Tenets and Six Questions for Landscape Urbanism)
 1996

New Urbanism
Dont just think of space, think of time.
Andres Duany
New Urbanism
New Urbanism promotes the creation and restoration
of diverse, walkable, compact, vibrant, mixed-use
communities composed of the same components as
conventional development, but assembled in a more
integrated fashion, in the form of complete
communities. The principles of urbanism can be
applied increasingly to projects at the full range of
scales from a single building to an entire community.
o Walkability
o Connectivity
o Mixed-Use & Diversity
o Mixed Housing
o Quality Urban Design
o Traditional Neighbourhood Structure:
o Increased Density
o Green Transportation
o Sustainability
o Quality of Life
New Urbanism
Application
The Driehaus Architecture Prize is an award
that recognizes efforts in New Urbanism and
New Classical Architecture, and is endowed
with a prize money twice as high as that of
the modernist Pritzker Prize.
The general principals as noted about could
be applied to any planning project. In the US
and Europe there have been several
developments where the principals of New
Urbanism have been applied.
 2000

Intelligent Urbanism
'Live in a village and plan for the world
- Prof Christopher Charles Benninger
Intelligent Urbanism
Principles of intelligent urbanism (PIU) is a theory Environmental sustainability
of urban planning composed of a set of ten axioms
intended to guide the formulation of city plans and Heritage conservation
urban designs Appropriate technology
The term was coined by Prof. Christopher Charles Infrastructure-efficiency
Benninger
Social access
Transit-Oriented Development
Human scale
Institutional integrity

Axioms Intended Target factors mentioned above

 balance with nature
Intelligent Urbanism balance with tradition
appropriate technology
Conviviality/ Social
A place for the individual
A place for friendship
A place for householders
A place for communities
A place for the city domain
A place for the neighbourhood
human scale
opportunity matrix
balanced movement
institutional integrity
regional integration
efficiency
 2010

Tactical Urbanism
The lack of resources is no longer an excuse not to act. The
idea that action should only be taken after all the answers and
the resources have been found is a sure recipe for paralysis.
The planning of a city is a process that allows for corrections; it
is supremely arrogant to believe that planning can be done
only after every possible variable has been controlled.
Jaime Lerner, former mayor of Curitiba, Brazil
 Tactical Urbanism
Temporary and Long Term fixes
Tactical urbanism is an umbrella term used to
describe a collection of low-cost, temporary
changes to the built environment, usually in cities,
intended to improve local neighbourhoods and city
gathering places
Short-term Action for Long term Change, a new
book by urban planners Mike Lydon and Anthony
Garcia is the first book to organize all the small fixes
that sprung up in so many communities in a way that
everyone can understand.
address common problems in communities today,
often in streets and public spaces: a lack of safe
sidewalks or crosswalks; the absence of clear
signage; the dearth of neighbourhood parks and
plazas, and, more broadly, the lack of community
connection and solidarity.
 2010
BIOPHILIC/ GREEN URBANISM
For more than 99% of human history people have lived in hunter-gatherer
bands totally and intimately involved with other organisms. During this
period of deep history, and still farther back ... they depended on an exact
learned knowledge of crucial aspects of natural history...In short, the brain
evolved in a bio centric world, not a machine-regulated world.
It would be therefore quite extraordinary to find that all learning rules
related to that world have been erased in a few thousand years, even in
the tiny minority of peoples who have existed for more than one or two
generations in wholly urban environments
Timothy Beatley
BIOPHILIC/ GREEN URBANISM
Blue Urbanism+ Green Urbanism
Characteristics:
Biophilia: The innately emotional affiliation of human beings Nature in the Space Patterns
to other living organisms. Innate means hereditary and hence Natural Analogues Patterns
part of ultimate human nature. Nature of the Space Patterns
-Edward O. Wilson (Coined the term)

Biophilic Cities are:

Cities that place nature at the heart of their design and
planning;
Cities that care about and actively protect, restore and
celebrate nature, biodiversity and wildness in around
them;
Cities that recognize the profound power nature has to
make us healthier, happier and to help us lead more
meaningful lives
Cities that seek through many means to foster deep
connections to the natural world
 2012

Cities designed for people, as opposed to those engineered for cars,

will be the places of urban, demographic growth in the 21st century.
GENERAL THEORY OF WALKABILITY Jeff Speck
GENERAL THEORY OF WALKABILITY
The General Theory of Walkability explains how the choice
to walk has to satisfy 4 main conditions: it must be useful,
safe, comfortable, and interesting. Each of these qualities is
essential.
a) Useful means that most aspects of daily life are located
close at hand and organized in a way that walking serves
them well. Useful Safe
b) Safe means that the street has been designed to give
pedestrians a fighting chance against being hit by
automobiles; they must not only be safe but feel safe,
which is even tougher to satisfy. Comfortable Interesting
c) Comfortable means that buildings and landscape shape
urban streets into outdoor living rooms, in contrast to Qualities of Walkable Neighbourhoods
wide-open spaces, which usually fail to attract pedestrians.
d) Interesting means that sidewalks are lined by unique
buildings with friendly faces and that signs of humanity
abound.
Parametric Urbanism
Variation of Parameters

Parametric Urbanism takes

the paradigm and tools of
parametric design into the domain of
urbanism.
A landscape is designed
taking parameters into account,
when these are understood and
identified a priori, i.e. as variables
that in different degrees configure
the project, so that the variations of
parameters necessarily alter the
project.
Landscapes designed with
3D parametric software (such as
Grasshopper plug in with
Rhinoceros).
Parametric Urbanism

Though parametricism has its roots in the

digital animation techniques of the mid-
1990s, it has only fully emerged in recent
years with the development of advanced
parametric design systems.
Parametricism has become the dominant,
single style for avant-garde practice today.
It is particularly suited to large-scale
urbanism as exemplified by a series of
competition-winning master-plans by
Zaha Hadid Architects.
Urban Morphology
 16-17th Century
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Canal ring Area -UNESCO World Heritage List

Amsterdam, the greatest planned city of northern Europe

The historic urban ensemble of the canal district of Amsterdam was
a project for a new port city built at the end of the 16th and
beginning of the 17th centuries.
The main canals, laid-out in a pattern of concentric half-circles,
chronicle the growth of Amsterdam during the 17th century, its
Golden Age.
The plan also envisaged interconnecting canals along radii; a set of
parallel canals (primarily for the transportation of goods, for
example, beer) and more than one hundred bridges
Washington DC 1791

Major Pierre (Peter) Charles L'Enfant

The plan specified that most streets would be laid out in a grid
To form the grid, some streets would travel in an east-west
direction, while others would travel in a north-south direction.
The diagonal avenues intersected with the north-south and
east-west streets at circles and rectangular plazas that would
later honor notable Americans and provide open space
L'Enfant laid out a 400 feet (122 m)-wide garden-lined "grand
avenue", which he expected to travel for about 1 mile (1.6 km)
along an east-west axis in the center of an area that would later
become the National Mall
He also laid out a narrower avenue (Pennsylvania Avenue)
which would connect the Congress house with the President's
house
 1853-1870
Haussmann's renovation of Paris
Known for Exclusive Boulevards
o Georges-Eugne Haussmann
o At that time Overcrowding, disease, crime, and unrest in the
center of the old Paris
Features:
A greatly expanded sewer system.
The construction of wide boulevards.
Gas lighting for the streets.
The formulation of public building regulations.
The construction of monuments.
An updated and uniform facade for the citys buildings.
A reorganized and symmetrical road system.
The construction of new parks.
The division of Paris into Districts.
 1880
La Plata, Argentina
City of Diagonals, City of Linden trees
La Plata was renamed Eva Pern
The city design and its buildings are noted to possess a
strong Freemason symbolism.
Rocha and Benoit
the Governor Palace was designed by Italians, the City
Hall by Germans
La Plata was planned and developed to serve as the
provincial capital after the city of Buenos Aires
city layout based on a rationalist conception of urban
centers
The city has the shape of a square with a central park
and two main diagonal avenues, north to south and
east to west
This design is copied in a self-similar manner in small
blocks of six by six blocks in length. For every six blocks,
there is a small park or square.
Other than the diagonal streets, all streets are on a
rectangular grid and are numbered consecutively.
La Ciudad Lineal Madrid, Spain 1882
Ciudad Lineal (Linear city in English) is a district in Madrid
Model of organization by the Spanish architect Arturo Soria y Mata
Similar to Reihendorf ("row village") is a particular form of German
settlement(rows of houses situated along a street, riverbank, valley or creek)
The first designed linear city
The city consist of a series of functionally specialized parallel sectors
Generally, the city would run parallel to a river or a central avenue.
o a purely segregated zone for railway lines,
o a zone of production and communal enterprises, with related scientific,
technical and educational institutions,
o a green belt or buffer zone with major highway,
o a residential zone, including a band of social institutions, a band of residential
buildings and a "children's band"
o a park zone, and
o an agricultural zone with gardens and state-run farms
Canberra,Australia 1908

Walter Burley and Marion Mahony Griffin's (the Griffins')

winning plan
City beautiful' and Garden City' town planning concepts
Major roads follow a wheel-and-spoke pattern
Griffin's proposal had an abundance of geometric patterns,
including concentric hexagonal and octagonal streets
emanating from several radii
The lakes stretch from east to west and divided the city in
two; a land axis perpendicular to the central basin
The Griffins' used the topography to provide fitting sites,
approaches, outlooks and backdrops for great buildings to
house the nation's major institutions of democracy, for
ceremonial occasions, and for other purposes related to the
national functions of the city
The open space system, the hills, and grand avenues
accentuate natural axes and become both the symbolic and
functional base for the Capital
Canberra 1908
The Griffins' design had four main elements
o Use of topography as an integral design feature and as a
setting
o A symbolic hierarchy of land uses designed to reflect the order
and functions of democratic government
o A Geometric Plan with the central triangle formed by grand
avenues terminating at Capital Hill, the symbolic centre of the
nation
o System of Urban Centres
Canberra has been developed as a series of separate but linked
towns, established in valleys and shaped and separated from
each other by a system of open space
This arrangement has protected the major hills and ridges
from development, and has created a scenic backdrop and
natural setting for the urban areas.
It has reinforced the garden character for which Canberra is
renowned.
 1908

Urban Morph, Canberra

Urban Structure
The Radiant City 1924
An unrealized urban masterplan by Le Corbusier
Designed to contain effective means of transportation, as well as an abundance
of green space and sunlight
Led to the development of new high-density housing typologies
At the core of Le Corbusiers plan stood the notion of zoning: a strict division of
the city into segregated commercial, business, entertainment and residential
areas.
The business district was located in the center, and contained monolithic mega-
skyscrapers, each reaching a height of 200 meters and accommodating five to
eight hundred thousand people.
Located in the centre of this civic district was the main transportation deck, from
which a vast underground system of trains would transport citizens to and from
the surrounding housing districts.
Broadacre City 1932

Proposed by Frank Lloyd Wright

Presented the idea in his book The Disappearing City in 1932.
Each U.S. family would be given a one acre (4,000 m) plot of
land from the federal lands reserves
Broadacre is a continuous metropolitan region of low density.
Areas designated to serve similar purposes are allocated
functionally (parallel along traffic systems of more than
regional importance like monorail and motorway):
trade, entertainment, industry, agriculture, housing etc..
Arrangements are selective - idealized - but not exclusive
In a sense it was the exact opposite of transit-oriented
development
All important transport is done by automobile and the
pedestrian can exist safely only within the confines of the one
acre (4,000 m) plots where most of the population dwells.
Heavy criticism in the late 1950s by many critics such as Jane
Jacobs, in her book The Death and Life of Great American
Cities.
Belo Horizonte, Brazil 1940
'Beautiful Horizon'

Aarao ReisIn
Oscar Niemeyer designed the Pampulha Neighbourhood
These two men are largely responsible for the wide avenues,
large lakes, parks and jutting skylines that characterise the
city today
An interesting feature of Reis' downtown street plan for Belo
Horizonte was the inclusion of a symmetrical array of
perpendicular and diagonal streets named after Brazilian
states and Brazilian indigenous tribes
Planned and built during the late 20th Century to replace
Ouro Preto as the capital of the surrounding region, it now
boasts a wide mix of modern and classical architecture
Many of the most interesting buildings are located in the
Pampulha area - including one of the world's biggest football
stadiums, the Mineiro.
Belo Horizonte is located on several hills and surrounded by
mountains
 1947
Copanhagen, Denmark
Finger Plan
o The first municipal plan was the Finger Plan in 1947 which
was inspired by Abercrombies Greater London Plan from 1944

Reputation as leading Green City

One of lowest Carbon foot print
Hardcore Green Building standards

o According to the plan, Copenhagen is to develop along five

'fingers', centred on commuter rail lines, which extend from
the 'palm', that is the dense urban fabric of central
Copenhagen
o In between the fingers, green wedges are supposed to provide
land for agriculture and recreational purposes.
o The plan recommended that Copenhagen's suburbs should be
developed as small independent urban communities
connected to the city by radial railway lines and roads.
o Cycling
o Walking
 1954
El Salvador, Chile
El Salvador is a small town in the middle of nowhere
(Atacama Dsesert) in Chile
After discovering a huge amount of copper ore in
1954, the Anaconda Mining Company had to build a
self-sustaining town to house its workers.
Designed by an American architect Raymond Olson,
it is supposedly built in the shape of a Roman helmet
The town was finished in 1959, the same year that
the El Salvador mine was opened
The city was home to as many as 24,000 people but
today has around 7,000 and is still an active mining
town
Auroville, Puducherry 1968
Endorsed by UNESCO and GOI
Founded by Mirra Alfassa and Designed by Roger Anger (French)
The Galaxy concept of the city-laid out in form of a galaxy - a
galaxy in which several 'arms' seem to unwind from a central
region
Model of the 'city of the future'
Radiating out beyond the Matrimandir Gardens are four Zones,
each focusing on an important aspect of the townships life:
o Industrial (north)
o Cultural (north east),
o Residential (south/south west) and
o International (west)
Surrounding the city area is a Green Belt with scattered
settlements for those involved in green work
Islamabad, Pakistan 1959
A Greek firm of architects, Konstantinos Apostolos Doxiadis, city based on a
grid plan which was triangular in shape with its apex towards the Margalla
Hills
The seat of government is housed in the northeast, while residential and
allied facilities are accommodated in the south.
Southwest in a lattice of grids house federal government employees in the
immediate vicinity of the secretariat.
A national park for recreation and institutions of national importance was
planned on the eastern side of Islamabad Highway.
The road network is dependent upon the natural axis of the valley.
 1960
Brasilia, Brazil This was a new city of clean lines, rational planning, and space.
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Built to be traversed not on foot but in the motorcar.
From the air, the city was designed like an airplane - this was
1827 by Jos Bonifcio an era in love with air travel.
The wings were where Brasilia's bureaucrats would live, the
Urban Planner Lcio Costa fuselage where they work
Chief Architect Oscar Niemeyer It's difficult as a pedestrian - it doesn't always feel like it's on a
Landscape designer Roberto Marx scale designed for humans
Kabul 2004
City Of Light Development
An urban reconstruction plan, first proposed by urban
planner and architect Hisham N. Ashkouri to revitalize the
capital city of Afghanistan.
The plan targets an area just south of the Kabul River for
redevelopment.
This area, approximately 3.5km long and 1.75 km wide, still
hosts residences, commercial and retail activity, despite
the fact that it has been largely reduced to rubble after
years of occupation and civil war, and many of the
collapsed structures have become temporary shelters
constructed of whatever is available, without building codes
or standards.
The design of the City Of Light is based on an "Arid Region
Design Technique" that has proven itself over the past
decades in cities such as Istanbul, Baghdad, Isfahan, and
Kabul.
Putrajaya, Malaysia 1993-2001

The city is planned to embrace two main themes --

city in a garden and an intelligent city.
Large proportion of the city area is designated as
green open space
Water body (man-made lake and wetlands) created
within the city
38km of waterfront area created by the lake
City is divided into twenty precincts; core
employment and commercial precincts located on
Core Island
Peripheral precincts (residential precincts) planned
based on the neighborhood planning concept
A 4.2km long Boulevard forms the central spine

o Central Business District

o Intelligent Transportation System(ITS)
o Facilities Management Systems(FMS)
o Public Information And Emergency Systems
o Smart Buildings; a pilot Smart Grid
Green Health City, Hainan, China 2013

Green Health City proposal by Peter Ruge Architekten is an

ecologically sustainable development
Five island districts bring together world-class medical
facilities
A system of design is guided by concepts related to; 5
Elements - City of Creation; 5 Organs - City of Health; 5
Senses - City of Communication; 5 Islands - City of
Relaxation; and 5 Rings - City of Individual Transport
Direct access to electro bus, e-car, bicycle hire services and a
general circuit elevated magnetic railway network that use
zero emission rechargeable battery operated power offers a
variety of flexible and sustainable transportation options
 Odintsovo, Moscow, Russia 2015

EcoCity Proposal by de Architekten Cie

Iconographic urban fabric, cultivating existing greenery, enabling forest to
penetrate to the centre, forming green rooms, and greening (planting trees)
on existing boulevards, the scale of the city is formatted on a human scale
The surroundings of Odintsovo are characterized by a rich and beautiful
network of water bodies and natural green penetrating the city

Several instruments play a key role in the regeneration of Odintsovo:

1. Connecting points: a network of green boulevards, pedestrian paths and

iconic public spaces
2. Framing space: defining urban rooms
3. Creating diversity
Outcomes
Habitation
Residential districts must occupy the best
locations within the urban space, using the
topography to advantage,
Taking the climate into account, and having
the best exposure to sunshine with accessible
verdant areas at their disposal
The selection of residential zones must be
dictated by considerations of public health
Reasonable population densities must be
imposed, according to the forms of habitation
suggested by the nature of the terrain itself
A minimum number of hours of exposure to
the sun must be determined for each
dwelling
Habitation
The alignment of dwellings along transportation
routes must be prohibited
The resources offered by modern techniques for
the erection of high structures must be taken
into account.
High buildings, set far apart from one another,
must free the ground for broad verdant areas.
Urbanism is a three-dimensional, not a two-
dimensional, science. Introducing the element
of height will solve the problems of modern
traffic and leisure by utilizing the open spaces
thus created.
For the architect occupied with the tasks of
urbanism, the measuring rod will be the human
scale.
Leisure

Every residential district must include the green area

necessary for the rational disposition of games and
athletic sports for children, adolescents, and adults.
Unsanitary blocks( Slums) of houses must be
demolished and replaced by green areas: the adjacent
housing quarters will thus become more sanitary.
The new green areas must serve clearly defined
purposes, namely, to contain the kindergardens,
schools, youth centers, and all other buildings for
community use, closely linked to housing.
The weekly hours of free time should be passed in
favourable prepared places: parks, forests, playing
fields, stadiums, and beaches.
An assessment must be made of the available natural
elements: rivers, forests, hills, mountains, valleys,
lakes, and the sea.
 Work

The distances between places of work and places of

residence must be reduced to a minimum
The industrial areas must be independent of the
residential areas, and separated from one another by a
zone of vegetation
The industrial zones must be contiguous to the railroad,
the canal, and the highway
The craft occupations, closely bound up with the urban
life from which they directly arise, must be able to
occupy clearly designated places within the city
The business city, devoted to public and private
administration, must be assured of good
communications with the residential quarters, as well
as with industry or craft workshops remaining within or
near the city.
Traffic
The whole of city and regional traffic circulation must be
closely analysed on the basis of accurate statisticsan
exercise that will reveal the traffic channels and their flow
capacities.
Flexibility in the choice of mode of Transportation
Traffic channels must be classified according to type and
constructed in terms of the vehicles and speeds they are
intended to accommodate
Traffic at high-density intersections will be dispersed in an
uninterrupted flow by means of changes of level
The pedestrian must be able to follow other paths than the
automobile.
Roads must be differentiated according to their purposes:
residential roads, promenades, throughways, and
principal thoroughfares.
As a rule, verdant zones must isolate the major traffic
channels.
The historic heritage of cities
Architectural assets must be protected, whether
found in isolated buildings or in urban
aggregations
They will be protected if they are the expression
of a former culture and if they respond to a
universal interest
The destruction of the slums around historic
monuments will provide an opportunity to
create verdant areas.
The practice of using styles of the past on
aesthetic pretexts for new structures erected in
historic areas has harmful consequences.
Neither the continuation of such practices nor
the introduction of such initiatives should be
tolerated in any form.
References
Bandopadhyay, A.; Text book of Town Planning, Books and Allied, Calcutta 2000
Bluestone, Daniel M.; Detroits City Beautiful and the Problem of Commerce Journal of the
Society of Architectural Historians ,Columbia University, (September 1988)
Beatley, Timothy (2010), Biophilic Cities: Integrating Nature Into Urban Design and Planning,
Island Press
Gallion, Arthur B. and Eisner, Simon; The Urban Pattern City planning and Design, Van
Nostrand Reinhold company
Jacobs, Jane;The Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York: Random House, 1961)
Liveable Cities, the benefits of urban environmental planning, The Cities Alliance, 2007
Lynch, Kevin (1960). The Image of the City. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
Mumford, Lewis (1954) ,The Neighbourhood and the Neighbourhood Unit, The Town Planning
Review
Planning and Urban Design Standards, APA, Wiley Publication, New Jersey
Rangwala, Town Planning, Charotar publishing House
Ratcliffe, John; An Introduction to Town and Country Planning, Hutchinson 1981
Turner, Tom, City as landscape, London E&FN Spon,1996
UN habitat Report
Picture Courtesy: Wikimedia,Google Images