A city is not a tree
01 Jan 2017-
About: The article was published on 2017-01-01 and is currently open access. It has received 278 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Tree (data structure).
Citations
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11 Apr 2016
TL;DR: This paper identifies a valuable alternative to the lengthy and costly collection of activity survey data: mobile phone data, which will make it possible to test Jacobs's theories at scale and promises to have a great impact on urban studies.
Abstract: The Death and Life of Great American Cities was written in 1961 and is now one of the most influential book in city planning. In it, Jane Jacobs proposed four conditions that promote life in a city. However, these conditions have not been empirically tested until recently. This is mainly because it is hard to collect data about "city life". The city of Seoul recently collected pedestrian activity through surveys at an unprecedented scale, with an effort spanning more than a decade, allowing researchers to conduct the first study successfully testing Jacobs's conditions. In this paper, we identify a valuable alternative to the lengthy and costly collection of activity survey data: mobile phone data. We extract human activity from such data, collect land use and socio-demographic information from the Italian Census and Open Street Map, and test the four conditions in six Italian cities. Although these cities are very different from the places for which Jacobs's conditions were spelled out (i.e., great American cities) and from the places in which they were recently tested (i.e., the Asian city of Seoul), we find those conditions to be indeed associated with urban life in Italy as well. Our methodology promises to have a great impact on urban studies, not least because, if replicated, it will make it possible to test Jacobs's theories at scale.
167 citations
Cites background from "A city is not a tree"
...In his paper ‘A City is Not a Tree’ [1], Christopher Alexander argued that the variety and diversity essential for urban vitality was being destroyed by the implementation of zoning laws....
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors explored the 15-min city concept as a structural and functional element for redesigning contemporary cities and performed a study of three case cities that have adopted this new model of city vision.
Abstract: As cities are struggling to cope with the second wave of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the idea of 15-min cities seem to have sparked planners’ imagination and politicians’ willingness for providing us with a new urban planning eutopia. This paper explores the “15-min city” concept as a structural and functional element for redesigning contemporary cities. Methodologically, a study of three case cities that have adopted this new model of city vision, is carried out. The analysis focus on understanding how the idea of 15-min cities fits the legacies of different cities as described by traditional planning principles in the context of three evaluation pillars: inclusion, safety and health. The paper argues that the 15-min city approach is not a radical new idea since it utilizes long established planning principles. Nevertheless, it uses these principles to achieve the bottom-up promotion of wellbeing while it proposes an alternative way to think about optimal resource allocation in a citywide scale. Hence, application of 15-min city implies a shift in the emphasis of planning from the accessibility of neighborhood to urban functions to the proximity of urban functions within neighborhoods, along with large systemic changes in resource allocation patterns and governance schemes citywide.
121 citations
Cites background from "A city is not a tree"
...To this end, Alexander in his work “The city is not a tree” painstakingly decomposed the basic design principles of the modernist movement and demonstrated how the natural, when unconstrained by artificial conceptions, shows itself to be a semilattice [15]....
[...]
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present an overview of strategies for improving subjective well-being through urban planning, which include: enhance conditions for active travel; improve public transport while restricting cars; provide easy access to facilities and services; develop or steer technology and emerging mobility options to improve inclusiveness and quality of life for different groups; integrate various forms of urban nature as much as possible; provide accessible, inclusive public spaces and communal spaces; maintain upkeep and order in urban space, vegetation, and transport systems; implement noise reduction strategies; develop aesthetically pleasing buildings and public spaces based
112 citations
Cites background from "A city is not a tree"
...…friends and family and facilitates the development and maintenance of larger overall social networks since it increases proximity among a larger number of people and provides greater access to “third places” (Alexander, 1965; Balducci & Checchi, 2009; Gehl, 2013; Jacobs, 1961; Mouratidis, 2018a)....
[...]
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors analyze tactical urbanism initiatives in the United States considering three main aspects: the process, its interaction with planning institutions and the respective urban design outcomes, and suggest some contributions that tactical-urbanism can make to urban design and spatial planning, in evolutionary terms.
Abstract: Tactical urbanism initiatives have been interpreted as an alternative and a challenge to formal spatial planning tools to the need for a more responsive planning system. Short-term implementation, scarce resources and citizens’ involvement are said to be the key characteristics of this emerging movement in urbanism. In tactical urbanism, everything seems focussed on one thing: action. This paper analyses tactical urbanism initiatives in the United States considering three main aspects: the process, its interaction with planning institutions and the respective urban design outcomes. For this, the relation between tactical urbanism and complexity theory (in which self-organisation and evolution play an important role) is addressed. Findings suggest some contributions that tactical urbanism can make to urban design and spatial planning, in evolutionary terms and possible role for tactical urbanism in alternative to traditional division between plan making and plan implementation.
76 citations
Cites background from "A city is not a tree"
...This happens not just due to the lack of means to introduce radical change in cities, but also because daily life is much more complex than a hierarchical and functional organisation of activities in cities (Alexander, 1965, Alexander et al., 1977)....
[...]
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors introduce the notion of "fourth places" as an additional category of informal social settings alongside "third places" and demonstrate that the latter conditions are effective in breaking the "placelessness" and "fortress" designs of newly designed urban public spaces and that, by doing so, they make 'fourth places' sociologically more open in order to bring strangers together.
Abstract: This paper introduces ‘fourth places’ as an additional category of informal social settings alongside ‘third places’. Through extensive empirical fieldwork on where and how social interaction among strangers occurs in the public and semi-public spaces of a contemporary masterplanned neighbourhood, this paper reveals that ‘fourth places’ are closely related to ‘third places’ in terms of social and behavioural characteristics, involving a radical departure from the routines of home and work, inclusivity and social comfort. However, the activities, users, locations and spatial conditions that support them are very different. They are characterized by ‘in-betweenness’ in terms of spaces, activities, time and management, as well as a great sense of publicness. This paper will demonstrate that the latter conditions are effective in breaking the ‘placelessness’ and ‘fortress’ designs of newly designed urban public spaces and that, by doing so, they make ‘fourth places’ sociologically more open in order to bring strangers together. The recognition of these findings problematizes well-established urban design theories and redefines several spatial concepts for designing public space. Ultimately, the findings also bring optimism to urban design practice, offering new insights into how to design more lively and inclusive public spaces.
69 citations
References
More filters
11 Apr 2016
TL;DR: This paper identifies a valuable alternative to the lengthy and costly collection of activity survey data: mobile phone data, which will make it possible to test Jacobs's theories at scale and promises to have a great impact on urban studies.
Abstract: The Death and Life of Great American Cities was written in 1961 and is now one of the most influential book in city planning. In it, Jane Jacobs proposed four conditions that promote life in a city. However, these conditions have not been empirically tested until recently. This is mainly because it is hard to collect data about "city life". The city of Seoul recently collected pedestrian activity through surveys at an unprecedented scale, with an effort spanning more than a decade, allowing researchers to conduct the first study successfully testing Jacobs's conditions. In this paper, we identify a valuable alternative to the lengthy and costly collection of activity survey data: mobile phone data. We extract human activity from such data, collect land use and socio-demographic information from the Italian Census and Open Street Map, and test the four conditions in six Italian cities. Although these cities are very different from the places for which Jacobs's conditions were spelled out (i.e., great American cities) and from the places in which they were recently tested (i.e., the Asian city of Seoul), we find those conditions to be indeed associated with urban life in Italy as well. Our methodology promises to have a great impact on urban studies, not least because, if replicated, it will make it possible to test Jacobs's theories at scale.
167 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explored the 15-min city concept as a structural and functional element for redesigning contemporary cities and performed a study of three case cities that have adopted this new model of city vision.
Abstract: As cities are struggling to cope with the second wave of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the idea of 15-min cities seem to have sparked planners’ imagination and politicians’ willingness for providing us with a new urban planning eutopia. This paper explores the “15-min city” concept as a structural and functional element for redesigning contemporary cities. Methodologically, a study of three case cities that have adopted this new model of city vision, is carried out. The analysis focus on understanding how the idea of 15-min cities fits the legacies of different cities as described by traditional planning principles in the context of three evaluation pillars: inclusion, safety and health. The paper argues that the 15-min city approach is not a radical new idea since it utilizes long established planning principles. Nevertheless, it uses these principles to achieve the bottom-up promotion of wellbeing while it proposes an alternative way to think about optimal resource allocation in a citywide scale. Hence, application of 15-min city implies a shift in the emphasis of planning from the accessibility of neighborhood to urban functions to the proximity of urban functions within neighborhoods, along with large systemic changes in resource allocation patterns and governance schemes citywide.
121 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present an overview of strategies for improving subjective well-being through urban planning, which include: enhance conditions for active travel; improve public transport while restricting cars; provide easy access to facilities and services; develop or steer technology and emerging mobility options to improve inclusiveness and quality of life for different groups; integrate various forms of urban nature as much as possible; provide accessible, inclusive public spaces and communal spaces; maintain upkeep and order in urban space, vegetation, and transport systems; implement noise reduction strategies; develop aesthetically pleasing buildings and public spaces based
112 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors analyze tactical urbanism initiatives in the United States considering three main aspects: the process, its interaction with planning institutions and the respective urban design outcomes, and suggest some contributions that tactical-urbanism can make to urban design and spatial planning, in evolutionary terms.
Abstract: Tactical urbanism initiatives have been interpreted as an alternative and a challenge to formal spatial planning tools to the need for a more responsive planning system. Short-term implementation, scarce resources and citizens’ involvement are said to be the key characteristics of this emerging movement in urbanism. In tactical urbanism, everything seems focussed on one thing: action. This paper analyses tactical urbanism initiatives in the United States considering three main aspects: the process, its interaction with planning institutions and the respective urban design outcomes. For this, the relation between tactical urbanism and complexity theory (in which self-organisation and evolution play an important role) is addressed. Findings suggest some contributions that tactical urbanism can make to urban design and spatial planning, in evolutionary terms and possible role for tactical urbanism in alternative to traditional division between plan making and plan implementation.
76 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors introduce the notion of "fourth places" as an additional category of informal social settings alongside "third places" and demonstrate that the latter conditions are effective in breaking the "placelessness" and "fortress" designs of newly designed urban public spaces and that, by doing so, they make 'fourth places' sociologically more open in order to bring strangers together.
Abstract: This paper introduces ‘fourth places’ as an additional category of informal social settings alongside ‘third places’. Through extensive empirical fieldwork on where and how social interaction among strangers occurs in the public and semi-public spaces of a contemporary masterplanned neighbourhood, this paper reveals that ‘fourth places’ are closely related to ‘third places’ in terms of social and behavioural characteristics, involving a radical departure from the routines of home and work, inclusivity and social comfort. However, the activities, users, locations and spatial conditions that support them are very different. They are characterized by ‘in-betweenness’ in terms of spaces, activities, time and management, as well as a great sense of publicness. This paper will demonstrate that the latter conditions are effective in breaking the ‘placelessness’ and ‘fortress’ designs of newly designed urban public spaces and that, by doing so, they make ‘fourth places’ sociologically more open in order to bring strangers together. The recognition of these findings problematizes well-established urban design theories and redefines several spatial concepts for designing public space. Ultimately, the findings also bring optimism to urban design practice, offering new insights into how to design more lively and inclusive public spaces.
69 citations