Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements

AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture

B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

Behavioral Pattern Human Being in Settlements:

 Man is a SOCIAL ANIMAL
 There is a gradual socialization in the pattern of living which allow the whole population to
participate more and more in the city, facilities and resources
 Then in the modern city growth and change over time is dominant feature which must take
precedence in all planning consideration.
 Nature and extent of human settlements, confuses man with their physical structure(‘the built-up
area is the city’) or their institutional frame (‘the municipality is the city’);
 But human settlements have always been created by man’s moving in space and defining the
boundaries of his territorial interest and therefore of his settlements, for which he later created
a physical and institutional structure;
 When we view human settlements as systems of energy mobilised by man – either as basal
metabolic or as muscular or, recently, as commercial energy systems – we get new insights.
Classification of Human Settlements:
The earth itself can be considered a settlement on a planetary scale. Each continent that makes up the
earth can be considered a settlement. Every individual country can be looked upon as a settlement on
another scale, with its cities, towns and villages comprising settlements at a more local scale. Tribes, in
the modern context, can be considered as the smallest of human settlement types.
A common term classification is between rural and urban human settlements.
According to the Encyclopedia Britannica (2001). “An urbanized area is defined as having a population
of at least 50,000 and a population density of at least 1,000 per square mile”
Besides the distinction between urban and rural areas made on the basis of population density, rural
areas can usually be characterized by a more homogeneous community based on traditional values, an
agriculture-related occupation and a small-scale local economy. Human settlements can also be classified
based on two other criteria;
•Population and •geographical distribution characteristics
Classification of human settlements is difficult to standardize due to the wide-ranging diversity in human
settlement typologies globally. Hence, it is not surprising to find numerous classification methodologies.
Based on Sizes.

 Small and sparsely spaced (rural settlements or villages specializing in agriculture)

 Large and closely spaces (urban settlements specializing in secondary and tertiary activities)
Based on Location of Settlements / Settings– Plains, Plateaus, Mountains, Coastal, Forest, Desert etc.
Based on Physical Forms – form as the expression of content, function and structure
Based on Five Elements of Human Settlements
Based on Functions – which are important to an understanding of the meaning and role of settlements.
 Reveal nature, specialization and reason  Based on activity (economic, social). Their performance or
special role (as dormitories, retirement villages, etc.)  Farming villages, Fisherman villages, pastoral
villages etc.,
Based on Time Dimension – age of settlements, their place in continuum (past, present, future), their
relative static of dynamic character, the whole process of their growth.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

Based on degree of society’s conscious involvement in settlements creation natural and planned
settlements
Based on institutions, legislations and administrations which society has created for settlements
1. Based on FORMS/SHAPES of the settlements:
a. Linear pattern: In such settlements houses are located along a road, railway line, river, canal edge
of a valley
b. Rectangular pattern: Such patterns of rural settlements are found in plain areas. The roads are
rectangular and cut each other at right angles.
c. Circular pattern: Circular villages develop around lakes, tanks and sometimes the village is
planned in such a way that the central part remains open and is used for keeping the animals to
protect them from wild animals.
d. Star like pattern: Where several roads converge, star shaped settlements develop by the houses
built along the roads.
e. T-shaped, Y-shaped, Cross-shaped or cruciform settlements: T –shaped settlements develop at tri-
junctions of the roads. Y–shaped settlements emerge as the places where two roads converge on the
third one and houses are built along these roads. Cruciform settlements develop on the cross-roads
and houses extend in all the four direction.
f. Double village: These settlements extend on both sides of a river where there is a bridge or a
ferry
2.Settlements are classified on the basis of size and function into URBAN and RURAL.
URBAN SETTLEMENTS: These types of settlement are nodal in character and have secondary and
tertiary activities. The chief occupation of the people of urban areas is non-agricultural i.e. Industry,
trade and services. The major function of an urban area are trades and commerce, transport and
communication, mining and manufacturing, defence, administration, cultural and recreational
activities. Population density is high and the settlement size is large.
RURAL SETTLEMENTS: These settlements are chiefly concerned with primary activities such as
agriculture, mining, fishing, forestry etc. Most of the people of rural settlement are engaged in
agricultural work. The major function of rural settlement is agriculture and each settlement specializes
in various activities. Population density is small and the settlement size is small.
The basic differences between rural and urban settlements are as follows: T
he rural settlements derive their life support or basic economic needs from land based primary
economic activities, whereas, urban settlements, depend on processing of raw materials and
manufacturing of finished goods on the one hand and a variety of services on the other.
Cities act as nodes of economic growth, provide goods and services not only to urban dwellers but
also to the people of the rural settlements in their hinterlands in return for food and raw materials.
This functional relationship between the urban and rural settlements takes place through transport
and communication network.
Rural and urban settlements differ in terms of social relationship, attitude and outlook. Rural people
are less mobile and therefore, social relations among them are intimate. In urban areas, on the other
hand, way of life is complex and fast, and social relations are formal.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

FACTORS INFLUENCING RURAL SETTLEMENT

Types of the settlement are determined by the extent of the built-up area and inter-house distance.
There are various factors and conditions responsible for having different types of rural settlements.
These include:
(i) Physical features – nature of terrain, altitude, climate and availability of water
(ii) (ii) cultural and ethnic factors – social structure, caste and religion
(iii) (iii) Security factors – defence against thefts and robberies. Rural settlements can broadly
be put into four types:
1. COMPACT/CLUSTERED/NUCLEATED/AGGLOMERATED
2. SEMI COMPACT/SEMI CLUSTERED/FRAGMENTED
3. HAMLETED
4. DISPERSED/ISOLATED
CLUSTERED / COMPACT SETTLEMENTS:
The clustered rural settlement is a compact or closely built up area of houses. In this type of village the
general living area is distinct and separated from the surrounding farms, barns and pastures. The closely
built-up area and its intervening streets present some recognisable pattern or geometric shape, such as
rectangular, radial, linear, etc. Such settlements are generally found in fertile alluvial plains. Sometimes,
people live in compact village for security or defence reasons, Scarcity of water has necessitated
compact settlement for maximum utilisation of available water resources.
SEMI-CLUSTERED/SEMI-COMPACT SETTLEMENTS:
Semi-clustered or fragmented settlements may result from tendency of clustering in a restricted area of
dispersed settlement. More often such a pattern may also result from segregation or fragmentation of a
large compact village. In this case, one or more sections of the village society choose or is forced to live
a little away from the main cluster or village. In such cases, generally, the land-owning and dominant
community occupies the central part of the main village, whereas people of lower strata of society and
menial workers settle on the outer flanks of the village.
HAMLETED SETTLEMENTS:
Sometimes settlement is fragmented into several units physically separated from each other bearing a
common name. This segmentation of a large village is often motivated by social and ethnic factors.
DISPERSED/ISOLATED SETTLEMENTS:
Dispersed or isolated settlement pattern appears in the form of isolated huts or hamlets of few huts in
remote jungles, or on small hills with farms or pasture on the slopes. Extreme dispersion of settlement is
often caused by extremely fragmented nature of the terrain and land resource base of habitable areas.
TYPES OF URBAN SETTLEMENTS: Unlike rural settlements, urban settlements are generally compact and
larger in size. They are engaged in a variety of non-agricultural, economic and administrative functions.
Cities are functionally linked to rural areas around them. Thus, exchange of goods and services is
performed sometimes directly and sometimes through a series of market towns and cities. Thus, cities are
connected directly as well as indirectly with the villages and also with each other. Urban settlements are
classified on the basis of its size of the POPULATION, OCCUPATIONAL STRUCTURE AND
ADMINISTRATION.
1. Population size: - in India a settlement having population more than 5000 persons is called urban. In
Japan it is 30000 persons whereas in Sweden it is 250 persons. The cut off figure depends on the density
of population in the country.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

2. Occupational structure: - besides population size, occupation is also taken as the criteria. In India, if
more than 75 per cent of workforce is engaged in non-agricultural activities then the settlement is called
as urban. Other countries have their own criteria for e.g. in Italy it is 50 per cent.
3. Administrative structure: - in India a settlement is classified as urban if it has a municipality,
cantonment board or a notified area. In Brazil any administrative centre is termed as urban.
FUNCTIONAL CLASSIFICATION OF TOWNS: Apart from their role as central or nodal places, many
towns and cities perform specialised services. Some towns and cities specialise in certain functions and
they are known for some specific activities, products or services. However, each town performs a number
of functions. On the basis of dominant or specialised functions,
1. Administrative Towns: - National capitals, which have headquarters of the administrative offices of
Central Government, are called administrative towns, such as New Delhi, Canberra, Moscow, and
Washington.
2. Defence Towns: - Centres of military activities are known as defence towns. They are of three types:
Fort towns, Garrison towns and Naval bases. Jodhpur is a fort town; Mhow is a garrison town; and Kochi
is a naval base.
3. Cultural Towns: - towns famous for religious, educational or recreational functions are called cultural
towns. Places of pilgrimage, such as Jerusalem, Mecca, Jagannath Puri and Varanasi etc. are considered
as religious towns. There are also recreational towns such as Las Vegas in the USA.
4. Industrial Towns: - Mining and manufacturing regions. Dhanbad and Khetri are examples of mining
towns. Towns which have developed due to setting up of industries such as Jamshedpur are called
industrial towns.
5. Trading and Commercial Towns: - Many old towns were famous as trade centres such as Lahore in
Pakistan, Baghdad in Iraq and Agra in India. Some towns have developed as transport towns such as
Rotterdam in the Netherlands, Aden in Yemen and Mumbai in India are port towns

Other Dominant functions of urban areas are:

i. The earlier functions of towns were related to administration, trade, industry, defence and religious.
ii. Today, towns perform multiple functions such as, RECREATIONAL, RESIDENTIAL, TRANSPORT, MINING,
MANUFACTURING AND MOST RECENTLY ACTIVITIES RELATED TO INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY.
iii. Some towns are known for their functions for example, Sheffield as an industrial city, London as a
port city, Chandigarh as an administrative city. iv. Large cities have a rather greater diversity of
functions.

Depending on the size and the services available and functions rendered, urban centres are
designated as town, city, million city, conurbation, and megalopolis.
i. Town: Population size in town is higher than the village. Functions such as, manufacturing, retail
and wholesale trade, and professional services exist in towns
ii. City: A city may be regarded as a leading town. Cities are much larger than towns and have
a greater number of economic functions. They tend to have transport terminals, major financial
institutions and regional administrative offices. When the population crosses the one million mark
it is designated as a million city.
iii. Conurbation: The term conurbation was coined by Patrick Geddes in 1915 and applied to a
large area of urban development that resulted from the merging of originally separate towns
or cities. Greater London, Greater Mumbai, Manchester, Chicago and Tokyo are examples.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

iv. Megalopolis: This Greek word meaning “great city”, was popularised by Jean Gottman (1957)
and signifies ‘super- metropolitan’ region extending, as union of conurbations. The urban
landscape stretching from Boston in the north to south of Washington in U.S.A. is the best known
example of a megalopolis.
URBAN TOWNS AND CITIES IN INDIA
The urban area comprises two types of towns namely; STATUTORY TOWNS AND CENSUS TOWNS
STATUTORY TOWNS: All places with a Municipality, Corporation, Cantonment Board or Notified town
area committee, etc. are known as statutory towns.
CENSUS TOWNS: All other places satisfying the following three criteria simultaneously are treated as
Census towns. (i) A minimum population of 5,000; (ii) At least 75% of male working population engaged
in non-agricultural pursuits; and (iii) A density of population of at least 400 per sq.km (1000 per sq.
mile)
OUT GROWTHS (OG) It is viable unit such as village or a hamlet or a enumeration block and clearly
identifiable in terms of its boundaries and location. While determining the outgrowth of a town, it has
been ensured that it possesses the urban features in terms of infrastructure and amenities and physically
contiguous with the core town of the UA. Outgrowths included “fairly large well recognised railway
colonies, university campuses, port areas, military establishments etc., which might have come up around
a core city or a statutory town”.
URBAN AGGLOMERATION (UA) An urban agglomeration is a continuous urban spread constituting a
town and its adjoining outgrowths (OG), or two or more physically contiguous towns together with or
without outgrowths of such towns.

CLASSIFICATION OF TOWNS ON THE BASIS OF POPULATION SIZE IN INDIA

Census of India classifies urban centres into six classes. Urban centre with population of more than one
lakh is called a city or class I town. Cities accommodating population size between one to five million are
called metropolitan cities and more than five million are mega cities. Majority of metropolitan and mega
cities are urban agglomerations. An urban agglomeration may consist of any one of the following three
combinations:
(i) a town and its adjoining urban outgrowths,
(ii) two or more contiguous towns with or without their outgrowths, and
(iii) a city and one or more adjoining towns with their outgrowths together forming a contiguous
spread. Examples of urban outgrowth are railway colonies, university campus, port area,
military cantonment, etc. located within the revenue limits of a village or villages contiguous
to the town or city.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

1.Classifiation of settlemenst by By EKISTICS UNITS:

Four basic groups :
Minor Shells or Elementary units – Man (Anthropos), room, house;

Micro-Settlements – units smaller than, or as small as, the traditional town where people used, do and
still do achieve interconnection by walking (house group, small neighborhood);

Meso-Settlements – between traditional town & conurbation within which one can commute daily (small
polis, small metropolis, small eperopolis, eperopolis);

Macro-Settlements – whose largest possible expression is the Ecumenopolis Physical and

Social Units – Man as individual – smallest unit; Space – second unit either personally owned or shared
with others; Family Home – third unit Social Unit – Group of Homes

Ekistic Units Anthropos – 1 room – 2 house – 5 housegroup (hamlet) – 40 small neighborhood (village)
– 250 neighborhood – 1,500 small polis (town) – 10,000 polis (city) – 75,000 small metropolis –
500,000 metropolis – 4 million small megalopolis – 25 million megalopolis – 150 million small
eperopolis – 750 million eperopolis – 7,500 million Ecumenopolis – 50,000 million

Types of Rural Settlemets:

a. Farmsteads:
Widely scattered one or two room buildings, often with associated walls or other long, linear
features characterize this zone. These are thought to represent isolated farmsteads.
b. Nomadic Settlement:In nomadic settlement Nomadism flourishes i.., way of life of peoples who
do not live continually in the same place but move cyclically or periodically. It is distinguished

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

from migration, which is noncyclic and involves a total change of habitat. Nomadism does not
imply unrestricted and undirected wandering; rather, it is based on temporary centres whose
stability depends on the availability of food supply and the technology for exploiting it.
c. Semi- Nomadic Settlement: belonging or relating to an ethnic group or people who migrate
seasonally and cultivate crops during periods of settlement
d. Permanent Settlment:

Key Differences Between Urban and Rural

The fundamental differences between urban and rural are discussed in the following points:

1. A settlement where the population is very high and has the features of a built environment (an
environment that provides basic facilities for human activity), is known as urban. Rural is the
geographical region located in the outer parts of the cities or towns.
2. The life in urban areas is fast and complicated, whereas rural life is simple and relaxed.
3. The Urban settlement includes cities and towns. On the other hand, the rural settlement includes
villages and hamlets.
4. There is greater isolation from nature in urban areas, due to the existence of the built
environment. Conversely, rural areas are in direct contact with nature, as natural elements
influence them.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow
 Unit-3: Urban & RuralSettlements
AR-213: Human Settlements and Vernacular Architecture
B.Arch II Yr/IV Sem

5. Urban people are engaged in non-agricultural work, i.e. trade, commerce or service industry.
In contrast, the primary occupation of rural people is agriculture and animal husbandry.
6. Population wise, urban areas are densely populated, which is based on the urbanisation, i.e.
the higher the urbanisation, the higher is the population. On the contrary, the rural population
is sparse, which has an inverse relationship with agriculturism.
7. Urban areas are developed in a planned and systematic way, according to the process of
urbanisation and industrialisation. Development in rural areas is seldom, based on the
availability of natural vegetation and fauna in the region.
8. When it comes to social mobilisation, urban people are highly intensive as they change their
occupation or residence frequently in search of better opportunities. However, in rural areas
occupational or territorial mobility of the people is relatively less intensive.
9. Division of labour and specialisation is always present in the urban settlement at the time of
job allotment. As opposed to rural areas, there is no division of labour.

Ar. Somi Sareen| Faculty of Architecture & Planning, Integral University, Lucknow