Structure, process, product in urban design
Over the last decade Urban Design in the UK has become almost synonymous with ‘Big Architecture’. The people who have made the Urban Design headlines are almost exclusively architects. The profession has become very “product” oriented and proposals are increasingly judged by their building design qualities. While this is important, it is not the whole story. The processes that take place in urban areas, including the process of producing physical development itself, are also important and the structures within which development takes place are crucial to the way that an urban area develops over time. There is a need to establish coherent frameworks for urban areas which allow, and act as springboards for, the many processes that take place in towns and cities and provide the matrix within which buildings can relate to each other. This structural aspect is the essence of Urban Design and is what sets it apart from architecture.
Viewed in this way Urban Design is not the design of whole areas by the one hand (‘Big Architecture’), the mere allocation of land uses, the landscaping of hard areas or the prettification of streets. Without a coherent framework, none of these things can be successful. The structure of an area determines what is possible. Whether it is the grid of streets or the patterns of plots, the structure will allow some processes and building types to take place and deny others. The Urban Designer is primarily an interpreter and designer of coherent structures: of the relationships of streets, squares and blocks of development rather than of these elements themselves. As Jonathan Barnett, the Urban Designer in charge of Manhattan in the 60s and 70s said, “Urban Design is about designing the city without designing the buildings”.
Viewed in this way Urban Design is not the design of whole areas by the one hand (‘Big Architecture’), the mere allocation of land uses, the landscaping of hard areas or the prettification of streets. Without a coherent framework, none of these things can be successful. The structure of an area determines what is possible. Whether it is the grid of streets or the patterns of plots, the structure will allow some processes and building types to take place and deny others. The Urban Designer is primarily an interpreter and designer of coherent structures: of the relationships of streets, squares and blocks of development rather than of these elements themselves. As Jonathan Barnett, the Urban Designer in charge of Manhattan in the 60s and 70s said, “Urban Design is about designing the city without designing the buildings”.
The key role of the Urban Designer is to recognise existing patterns, to enhance these or change them and to provide new patterns if needed. It is often the job of others such as Landscape Architects, Engineers, and Architects to design and provide the artifacts that make up the city. The structures that the Urban Designer manipulates must be coherent and robust, able to provide the framework for development over a long period of time and capable of interpretation by those who will control or design the physical fabric. People know when a place is not structured. Older towns have a sense of structure derived from the gradual development of patterns over many years: areas changed only bit by bit and the old patterns could still be discerned in new development. In the modern, city structure has often been lost as whole areas together with their street patterns have been swept away. The architect has generally lost the capacity for relating new development to the older matrix that surrounds it. The settlements therefore become disjointed, fragmented and incoherent.
Structure is intimately concerned with character. A well-structured place develops its own personality and encourages designers and developers to recognise and enhance this. This emphasis on developing coherent structures for areas is an approach to Urban Design that allows the development of quick clear solutions. It is not concerned with developing the detail of groundscape, wallscape or landscape. It is concerned with creating sequences of places, connections between new places and existing elements, and the methods required to implement these such as plans and design briefs. Structure Process Product in urban design.
