Tales of 3 Cities

1. CITY OF DUALISM
KUALA LUMPUR
Bukit Bintang - Jalan Alor

2. Urban Grid
Irregular, no distinct
arrangement of building blocks
and range of street orientation.
Urban Fabric
Fine Grain focus at the west &
Coarse Grain at the east
Study Area
Open spaces
Building Foot Print
Figure-Ground Analysis
100m

3. Typology
City typology: Deformed
Building typology:
Linear, Point & Perimeter
Gradual change from linear
to point typology.
Study Area
Open spaces
Building Foot Print
Figure-Ground Analysis
100m

4. Geometric regularity
Regular geometry made up
linear city block at the west.
Mixture of different geometry
at the east.
Urban street
Denser urban street and
intersection point at the west.
Study Area
Open spaces
Building Foot Print
Figure-Ground Analysis
100m

5. Building Footprint
Varying footprint density. Density
of building footprint decrease
gradually from the west to east.
Solid and void
The ratio of void: solid at the
west is smaller than that in the
east.
Study Area
Open spaces
Building Foot Print
Figure-Ground Analysis
100m

6. Scale
Relatively smaller and more
humanising built form at
the west. Smooth transition
of building height from
terraced shop houses to
shopping complex and high
rises.
Study Area
Open spaces
Building Foot Print
Figure-Ground Analysis
100m

7. Movement Pattern Data
Main road
Subsidiary road
Back lane
Monorail station
100m
- Separate the city to smaller
island
- Street orientation in relation
to built form and types of
activities.

8. Activity Analysis
Church
Hotel
Residential-commercial
Shoplot
Shopping mall
High rise office tower
100m
- People oriented activities and
Target oriented activities
further explain the street
density.

9. Movement Pattern Data
Pedestrian Accessible
pathway
Jalan Sultan Ismail and
Jalan Bukit Bintang are
very busy thus not suitable
for pedestrian pathway.
The back lane and alley
connect the network
together and ease the
movement around the
area. However, some
alleys are very prone to
crimes and not well-
maintained revealing the
dark side of the city.
100m100m

10. FORMALITY
DAY TIME
Necessity Activity
Busy - Desolated
Cullen’s Serial Vision 1:

11. During the day time, necessary activities are carried out. Restaurants and hawker
stalls at the starting point of the street are open as the pedestrian movement is
denser. People working at nearby office tower or locals come here for lunch.
1 2

12. Note the cars parked along the street however with less human activities as only
grocery shops are operating. Functional activity is carried out as locals living at
upper floors come here for groceries. Less shops and restaurants are operating
and most are the shop owners who come to load and unload food to prepare for
night operating business.
3 4

13. As coming to the end of the street, shops are completely closed creating
a desolated environment. Pedestrian movement are minimal and only
locals living upstairs occasionally come down for lunch.
5 6

14. Note the
accessibility to
Jalan Alor from
alley and another
street, Changkat
Bukit Bintang.
7
9
8
10 11

15. INFORMALITY
NIGHT TIME
Optional Activity
Lively - Quite
Cullen’s Serial Vision 2:

16. Two rows of shophouses create a linear open space. Hanging lantern marks the
beginning of the lively journey and increases the engagement to the street. Note
high volume of pedestrian traffic at the starting point of Jalan Alor.
1 2

17. There is deconstruction of form during the night time. Flexibility in seating area as
plastic tables and chairs are set up along the road create a narrow pathway in
between and form a stronger linear movement pattern.
3 4

18. Pedestrian friendly street, multi functional buildings and wide selection of food
are the attractors of crowd. Increased intensity of crowd requires larger seating
area making the street narrower. Consumers are mostly tourist that come from
hotel nearby. There are also locals from other places who come here after work.
5 6

19. The bright lighting from the hawker stalls make the street stands out even more.
Large seating area and increased density of crowd blurs and weakens the
linearity of street making it very disorganized.
7 8

20. Density of crowd significantly reduces towards the end of the road as there are
lesser hawker stalls, making the street appear emptier and wider. The sudden
contrast makes the back of the street looks gloomy, and monotonous.
9 10

21. Local - Global
Cullen’s Serial Vision 3:

22. 1 2
1
2
Jalan Alor, a linear typology of triple storey shoplots typified the city changes in
function and occupation. This region has a fusion taste of urban and regional
development in which the city expand along corridors of hawker stalls and
seafood restaurants.

23. 3 4
3 4
Walking further up, this metropolitan region coincided with a more intense
circulation of commodities, people, and capital between the city centre and its
hinter-land, with ever more budget hotels, and tourist businesses at a lower rise
peripheries.

24. 5 6
5
6
At the turn, the megastructures of Public Bank, KL tower, Petronas Twin Tower,
Invito Hotel Suites gives a presence of urbanization and globalization, which has
support the movement of people, goods, services, information, news, products,
and money on its boundary.

25. Collage City
Local - Global Coarse grain – Fine grain Temporal - Permanent
High scale – Low scale
(Landmark)
Built form– Open space
(Node)
Separation - Connection
(Axis)
Soft - Hard
(Open Space)

26. 100m
Global
Local
Local low rise buildings are concentrated at the west while high end buildings with
globalized activities are concentrated at the east.

27. Coarse
Grain
Fine
Grain
Coarse grain consists of large scale weave that is functional it is usually inhospitable to
interact. Whereas, fine grain consists of several small blocks (averagely 20 – 30 blocks)
close together.
100m
URBAN
FABRIC

28. Permanent
Temporal
100m
Buildings of temporal function are where activities are not carried out the whole time as
it has a certain period of operating hours such as shopping malls. While for permanent
building will functional all day such as hotel and residential building.
FUNCTION

29. 100m
High Scale
Low Scale
LANDMARK
The higher scale landmark which are the shopping malls or hotels serve as an reference
point where it informs the arrival while the lower scale landmark like sculptures or
lower scale buildings serve as a significant gathering spot that could be easily
recognized.

30. Monorail station is a built form node where people go to and come from other places.
Open spaces between buildings also become nodes such as Jalan Alor where people
come for food and Pavilion Mall Plaza where people come for photographs with themed
decoration.
Monorail
Station
Open Space
NODE
Built Form
Pavilion
Mall Plaza
100m

31. Open spaces can mainly be categorized into two types. Soft spaces are public parks and
private softscape design within buildings while hard spaces are pavements mostly car
parks.
Soft
Hard
OPEN SPACE
100m

32. Connection
Separation
AXIS
North-south axis separates linear to point typology, localized to globalized, dense to less
dense while southwest-northeast axis connects these two regions together.
100m

33. Conclusion
As an urban jungle with rich culture of Malay, Chinese and
Indian, it allows tourists to experience the local culture with
modern and international twist. The inclusive Jalan Alor
shows contrast during day and night , welcome people from
all class group while bukit bintang as a high end area only
attracts more financially capable tourists or shoppers. The
Urban design of this area shows distinct duality and
encourages people to look at the two opposing aspects that
make this city a little more interesting.

34. Intangible Kuala Lumpur Georgetown Kuching
Functional
Dimension
most efficient public
transportation and
can be found easily
less efficient public
transportation
compared to kl
where they only
have buses
less efficient due to
the less dense of
population and the
short distance of
destination.
Perceptual
Dimension
diversity of
economy, pollution,
intermediate cost of
living, higher crime
rate
Less pollution Clean environment,
low crime rate, low
cost of living
Temporal
Dimension
Heritage building in
KL are preserved
however not in a
very good condition
heritage are
preserved well
less heritage
compare to
georgetown and it is
also well preserved.

35. Intangible Kuala Lumpur Georgetown Kuching
Social
Dimension
bringing live and
work together, aims
to be a global /
world class city
tourist hotspot high cultural value
Morphological
Dimension
deform grid , mostly
high rise and vertical
built form
compact building
arrangement
warped parallel grid
form
Visual
Dimension
Mix culture,
cosmopolitan
Rich in culture and
history
streetscape

36. Most Lovable City (Tales of wish)
FOO WEI MIN 0321577
Kuala Lumpur is the city I like the most. Bukit Bintang which is relatively high ended, reveal the selfish side of architecture
but it is very efficient building which have a mixture of pedestrian and target oriented activities. However, on the other side
of Jalan Sultan Ismail, which is Jalan Alor, are where the humanizing scaled terraced houses concentrated. It is very inclusive,
in contrast to that of Jalan Bukit Bintang, making people wants to stay a little longer. In short, I love how the duality in
different aspects contribute to the identity of this city.
CHARLENE TAN CUI ZHI 0320826
I, personally will choose Georgetown, Penang as my favourate city. The new insight to public spaces as 'liveability and
sustainability' has become the daily rhythms on this world heritage site. The urban planning and development has a focus on
the inter-relation in the quality of built forms, the economic potential, and the connectivity, walkability, accessibility as the
build elements for living, experiencing, and enjoying the city.
TEO CHEN YI 0320618
Georgetown is the kind of city I like because of the prioritized pedestrian walkway to serve the tourists to ask around the city
as it is a well known tourist spot. Also Georgetown is a city rich of historical heritage and culture where the architecture
there are in a very old and retro style which creates a reminiscence of memories about the history.

37. Most Lovable City (Tales of wish)
EUNICE CHAN YU MING 0315729
I like Georgetown because it has rich pedestrian walkway network. The distance to the next destination
close proximity to each other due to its small scale. Therefore, It is easy to access from place to place as it
is a walkable city regardless of its poor transportation service. Nevertheless, I also like how well
Georgetown has preserved their ancient heritage giving chances to the younger generation to witness the
transformation of the city.
KOH KAR YI 0320567
Kuala Lumpur is a very interesting city to me. Although having the highest crime rate among all three
cities, Kuala Lumpur has a lot more characteristics that make it the city that I like the most. Being the
capital of Malaysia, it becomes the node with a diversity of people and activities. Facilities, advanced
technology and extensive public transportation system are gathered here making it very convenient and
efficient. To the more experiential aspect, it is also full of places with high cultural values. Jalan Alor,
Petaling Street etc are examples of places in Kuala Lumpur that can engage users to the place. As it has
very high density of people, festival activities and other social events that can further enhance experience
of users. I think the exploration of this city can bring the users a lot of surprises.