Urban Morphology

Amity School of Architecture and Planning
M.Arch Programme, II Semester
Urban Morphology
ARCH648

Contents
Urban space and its Visual dimensions
Patterns and Aesthetic Order
Place Perceptions
Temporal dimensions
Contents

Learning Objectives
By end of this session you will be able to
understand how to perceive spaces in
terms of elements of visual aesthetics,
their notions and effect on a time basis.
Learning Objectives

Urban Space
• Closed
• Can be measured
• Has boundaries
• Static
• Surrounded by buildings
Positive Space
• Shapeless
• Left-over around buildings
• Lacking perceivable edges
• Lacking perceivable form
Negative Space

Urban Space
Creating positive space
Major space defining elements:
• Surrounding structures
• Floor
• Imaginary sphere of the sky over-head
• Urban space and building height ratio
+
• Urban space width and length ratio
“The ideal street must form a completely
enclosed unit”

Urban Space
Streets and Squares
Two main types of positive Urban space:
• Streets (Roads, paths, avenues, lanes, boulevards, alleys, etc.)
• Squares (Plazas, circuses, piazzas, places, courts, chowks, etc.)
Streets Dynamic spaces with a sense of movement
Squares Static spaces with less sense of arrival

Urban Space
Streets and Squares

Urban Space
Streets and Squares
Streets and Squares can be characterized as either:
• Strong sense of enclosure
• Orderly floorscape
• Arrangement of street furniture
• Surrounding buildings that
enhance the formality
• Often symmetrical layout
Formal
• More relaxed character
• A wide variety of
surrounding architecture
• An asymmetrical layout
Informal

Urban Space

The Visual dimension
• Visual – Aesthetic – dimension of Urban Design.
• Aesthetic preferences
• Appreciation of space and the aesthetic qualities of urban spaces and
townscape.
• Design elements that define
• Urban space
• Architecture
• Hard and soft landscaping

Aesthetic preferences
• Visual – Kinesthetic
• We move but the space is static (unmoving)
• All senses of the body
• Visual appreciation perception and cognition
‘stimuli’ we perceive
How we perceive
How we process, interpret and judge the information
How it appeals to our mind and emotions

Aesthetic preferences
• Perception and cognition
How we feel about the environment
What it means to us
Individual level
Cultural level
“notions of ‘beauty’ are socially and
culturally constructed”

Our intuitive capacity for aesthetic appreciation has four distinct components
that transcend time and culture
• Sense of Rhythm and pattern
• Appreciation of Rhythm
• Recognition of balance
• Sensitivity of harmonious relationships

Sense of Rhythm and pattern
• Rhyme involves some similarity in the elements
• Presupposes the simultaneous existence of complexity and patterns
• As the mind organizes and makes sense of the information, the patterns
become more dominant.

Appreciation of Rhythm
• Rhythm is produced by grouping of elements to create emphasis, interval,
accent and/or direction, etc.
• To avoid monotony, contrast and variety are essential in achieving interesting
rhythms.

Recognition of balance
• Balance in form of order is generally related to ‘harmony’ among the parts of a
visual scene or environment.
• An important aspect of this is surprise element.
• Although symmetry can be a powerful tool in achieving balance, symmetrical
compositions can appear mechanical and leaden.
• Asymmetrical compositions may also use elements of symmetry to achieve
visual balance but in more complex and potentially interesting ways.

Sensitivity to harmonic relationships
• Harmony concerns the relationships between different parts, and how they fit
together to form a coherent whole.

Place perceptions
• Perception means the process of becoming aware of physical
objects/phenomenon through senses
• We embrace images, experiences and meanings that are attached to the built
environment
• Place images are characterized by three key attributes according to Lynch:
• Identity
• Structure
• Meaning We live in time places!
Meaning to an environment is added
through attaching a symbolic value to it!
Culture, heritage, geography and physical
landscape add meaning to the structure!

Image of the city
- the mental picture people extract from the physical reality of the city
- a picture of parts of the city in physical relationship to each other
- Picture of the most salient features of a city’s form
- Skeletal elements of city form
The more imageable the city, the more legible it is!
The first stage of perceptional experience of a city, based on unconscious observations!

Beyond Images
• Mental/cognitive mapping
• Understanding of the essence of a city that
stays in a individual’s memory
• Visual Survey
• An examination of the form, appearance and
composition of a city as well as evaluation of
its assets and liabilities
• Attaches a ‘sense of a place’
• Strong bond between a person and the
environmental setting
Placelessness is the absence of a quality
of a place to be distinctive in character!

• Graphic examination of the key
physical elements and functional
character of an area.
• Visual survey is an urban design
tool used to communicate the
perceptions of the structure and
organization of a city.

Temporal perceptions
• According to Kevin Lynch, affect of time on space can be experienced by two
ways:
1. rhytmic repetition which refers to breathing/sleeping/walking/cycles of
sun/moon/the seasons
2. progressive and irreversible change which refers to growth and decay
time and space are related to each other.

• Three key aspects of temporal dimension of urban design are;
• Time cycles and management of activities in space.
• Continuity and stability.
• Changing urban design projects and policies.
Temporal dimensions

Time Cycles
Main time cycles are based on natural
cycles(our bodily cycles). The use of urban
space differs according to these cycles of day,
night, seasons. At different times of the day,
night, urban environment is perceived and used
differently and also users differ according to
changing time cycle.
Urban designers have to be aware of these
cycles to supply usable, effective, lively urban
environment. Otherwise the urban space starts to
be abandoned. The main point is to compose 24
hours sociable environments.

Time Management of Public Space
Mixed use creates more life and activity in allocation. So, different land uses can be
different preferences for different time cycles. Place design can differ according to
users such as retired people, working people. Their aim of the use of a place differs
according to their lifestyle.
Urban designers need to understand activity patterns, how to encourage activities through different time
periods and how to achieve synergies from activities happening in the space and time.
Street design can change according to time. As people visit an area to see what is going on, urban vitality
further stimulates and the public realm becomes animated by having more people on the streets and in cafes.

Urban designers need to understand how
environments adapt to change in this
process. It is important to distinguish what
is fundamental to the sense of place and
should remain, from what is less
important and can change. The visual and
physical continuity of valued places relates
to issue of the obsolescence of buildings
and environments.
In historic protection process although
there are many types of interventions such
as restoration, preservation,
refurbishment, conservation etc., it can
not prevent the obsolescence. Another
essential point of time dimension is to
aware of what stays the same and what
changes over time. While street and plot
patterns changes slowly, buildings and
land uses change rapidly because of the
effect of robustness, resilience. These
concepts have an fundamental role.

References;
1. ARCH355 Process of Urban Design, Eastern Mediterranean University,
https://arch355.wordpress.com/
2. Department of Architecture
3. Sennett Richard 1969, Classical Essays on the Culture of Cities, Prentice Hall,
New Jersey
4. The American City: What Works and What Doesn't
by Alexander Garvin (1995)

Thank You

Urban Morphology

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