This Presentation is about Sir Patrick Geddes, his concepts and Theories.

1. Sir Patrick Geddes
“Rural development, Urban Planning and City Design are not the same and adopting a
common planning process is disastrous”
Planning Concepts
Ravi Sharma

2. About Sir Patrick Geddes
• Sir Patrick Geddes (2 October 1854 – 17 April 1932) was a Scottish
biologist, sociologist, geographer, philanthropist and pioneering town
planner.
• He is known for his innovative thinking in the fields of urban
planning and sociology.
• He introduced the concept of "region" to architecture and planning and
coined the term "conurbation".
• Geddes was the founder of the College des Ecossaise (Scots College)
an international teaching establishment in Montpellier, France.
• He studied at the Royal College of Mines in London under Thomas
Henry Huxley between 1874 and 1878, and lectured in Zoology
at Edinburgh University from 1880 to 1888.

3. Patrick Geddes
• Also known as “Father of Modern Town Planning”
• First to link sociological concepts into town planning
The Sequence should be:
• Regional Survey
• Rural Development
• Town Planning
• City Design
These are kept up to-date
He gave his expert advice for
the improvement of about
18 major towns & cities in
India

4. Concepts..
• Patrick Geddes explained an organism’s relationship to its
environment as follows:
• “The environment acts, through function, upon the organism
and conversely the organism acts, through function, upon the
environment.“ (Cities in Evolution, 1915)
• In human terms this can be understood as a place acting
through climatic and geographic processes upon people and
thus shaping them. At the same time people act, through
economic processes such as farming and construction, on a
place and thus shape it. Thus both place and folk are linked
and through work are in constant transition.

5. Geddisian Triad
City

6. Geddes and The Valley Section
• Geddes first published his idea of the valley section in 1909 to
illustrate his idea of the 'region-city'.
• The region is expressed in the city and the city spreads influence of
the highest level into the region.
• To put it another way, Geddes said that "it takes a whole region to
make the city”.
• The valley section illustrated the application of Geddes's trilogy of
'folk/work/place' to analysis of the region.
• The valley section is a complex model, which combines physical
condition- geology and geomorphology and their biological
associations - with so-called natural or basic occupations such as
miner, hunter, shepherd or fisher, and with the human settlements
that arise from them.

7. • Geddes illustrated the section using the locally
available landscapes of Edinburgh and its hinterland

8. • Conurbation” -waves of population inflow to large
cities, followed by overcrowding and slum formation,
and then the wave of backflow – the whole process
resulting in amorphous sprawl, waste, and unnecessary
obsolescence.
Geddes and The Conurbation Theory

9. • The term "conurbation" was coined in 1915 by Patrick
Geddes in his book Cities In Evolution.
• Internationally, the term "urban agglomeration" is often
used to convey a similar meaning to "conurbation".
• He drew attention to the ability of the (then) new
technology of electric power and motorised transport to
allow cities to spread and agglomerate together, and gave as
examples "Midland ton" in England, the Ruhr in
Germany, Ramstad in the Netherlands, New York-Boston in
the United States, the Greater Tokyo Area and Taiheiyō
Belt in Japan and NCR of Delhi in India.

10. • A conurbation is a region comprising a number of cities,
large towns, and other urban areas that, through population
growth and physical expansion, have merged to form one
continuous urban and industrially developed area.
• In most cases, a conurbation is a polycentric urban
agglomeration, in which transportation has developed to link
areas to create a single urban labour market or travel to work
area.
• The term is used in North America, a metropolitan area can be
defined by the Census Bureau or it may consist of a central
city and its suburbs, while a conurbation consists of adjacent
metropolitan areas that are connected with one another by
urbanization.

11. Geddes and The Constellation Concept

12. • As we all saw in the map, prominent cities in
Maharashtra are shown to be connected forming a
‘CONSTELLATION’ shape.
• This CONSTELLATION THEORY was also coined
by Sir Patrick Geddes , “4 or more cities, which are
not economically, politically, socially equal come
together in developing a whole region”
• This theory is mostly used for administrative purpose
in all countries worldwide.
• Such theory is most prominently used because
planning cities in a particular shape pattern is not
possible in Today’s times.

13. Maharashtra- A Case Study
• Mumbai- Economic and Capital city
• Nasik- Religious city
• Aurangabad- Administrative city
• Nagpur- Political city
• Pune-Educational importance city

14. • He took over Thomas Short's
observatory in 1892
• spectacular views the surrounding city
region.
• Positioned at the top is the Camera
Obscura, which refracts an image onto a
white table within, for study and survey.
Patrick Geddes – Outlook Tower, Edinburg

15. • a tool for regional analysis, index museum
and the ‘world’s first sociological
laboratory’.
• It represents the essence of Geddes’s thought -
his holism, visual thinking, and commitment to
understanding the city in the region.
• He said of it: ‘Our greatest need today is to
conceive life as a whole, to see its many sides in
their proper relations, but we must have a
practical as well as a philosophic interest in
such an integrated view of life.
• Now the tower is home to the Patrick Geddes
Centre For Planning Studies, where an
archive and exhibition are housed.
Patrick Geddes – Outlook Tower

16. Thank You