Planning, History and Environment Series – serie

In this superbly illustrated book Xiaofei Chen presents the first analysis in English of a ubiquitous East Asian urban phenomenon: the supergrid and superblock urban structure. The book opens with an introductory essay by Barrie Shelton in which he sets the scene for what is to follow, emphasizing how alien this structure was to Western urban design culture where radial patterns of development were the norm. Then, in her first chapter, Chen explains the make-up of the supergrid and superblock urban structure and its contrasting Chinese and Japanese forms. In the following three chapters she digs deep into the history, cultural origins, and underlying design philosophy of the supergrid and superblock to show how, under different cultural influences, the model has developed into two distinct forms. Two further chapters (5 and 6) provide detailed analysis of two sample superblocks in China (in Xi’an and Nanjing) and two in Japan (in Kyoto and Osaka) to reveal the relative advantages and disadvantages of how the structure is manifest in the two countries. In her conclusion she discusses her findings to show how and why the supergrid and superblock structure is a valuable urban design model which, with regional adjustments, can be used effectively in cities other than those of East Asia.

Riyadh has set its sights on becoming a world city befitting the twenty-first century. To that end it has embarked on a massive construction drive evidenced in the proliferation of proposals for high-end districts, giga-developments and elaborate infrastructures. An urban vision seemingly dedicated to attracting global capital. Yet such a narrative can be misleading. A ‘humanization programme’, initiated during the tenure of its former mayor Abdulaziz bin Ayyaf, has complemented the city’s rapid rise by providing spaces catering for the everyday needs of its inhabitants. Yasser Elsheshtawy, in this richly illustrated book, targets these people-centred settings. It is a compelling counter-narrative interweaving critical theoretical insights, personal observations, and serendipitous encounters. He deftly demonstrates how Riyadh thrives through the actions of its people. As the world moves towards an urban model that is resilient and humane, the humanizing efforts of an Arab city are worthy of our attention. Riyadh’s premise is perhaps best captured in the cover image depicting the desert riverbed of Wadi Sulai, filled with rainwater, making its way towards the Saudi capital. Along its banks there will be dedicated public pathways and urban parks. It is a vision of an urbanity where both the spectacular and the everyday coexist. A city that is not just dedicated to the few, but one that serves the many.

Australia has long been a highly (sub)urbanized nation, but the major distinctive feature of its contemporary settlement pattern is that the great majority of Australians live in a small number of large metropolitan areas focused on the state capital cities. The development and application of effective urban policy at a regional scale is a significant global challenge given the complexities of urban space and governance. Building on the editors’ previous collection The Australian Metropolis: A Planning History (2000), this new book examines the recent history of metropolitan planning in Australia since the beginning of the twenty-first century. After a historical prelude, the book is structured around a series of six case studies of metropolitan Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Perth, the fast-growing metropolitan region of South-East Queensland centred on Brisbane, and the national capital of Canberra. These essays are contributed by some of Australia’s leading urbanists. Set against a dynamic background of economic change, restructured land uses, a more diverse population, and growing spatial and social inequality, the book identifies a broad planning consensus around the notion of making Australian cities more contained, compact and resilient. But it also observes a continuing gulf between the simplified aims of metropolitan strategies and our growing understanding of the complex functioning of the varied communities in which most people live. This book reflects on the raft of planning challenges presented at the metropolitan scale, looks at what the future of Australian cities might be, and speculates about the prospects of more effective metropolitan planning arrangements.

In Being Urban, Simon Goldhill and his team of outstanding urbanists explore the meaning of the urban condition, with particular reference to the Middle East. As Goldhill explains in his introduction, ‘What is a good city?’, five questions motivate the book:How can a city be systematically planned and yet maintain a possibility of flexibility, change, and the wellbeing of citizens?How does the city represent itself to itself, and image its past, its present and its future?What is it to dwell in, and experience, a city?How does violence erupt in and to a city, and what strategies of reconciliation and reconstruction can be employed?And finally, what is the relationship between the infrastructure of the city and the political process?Following the introduction, the twelve chapters are grouped into four sections: Engagement and Space; Infrastructure and Space; Conflict and Structures; and Curating the City. Through each chapter, the contributors reflect on aspects of urban infrastructure and culture, citizenship, belonging and exclusion, politics and conflict, with examples from across the Middle East, from Cairo to Tehran, Tel Aviv to Istanbul.Not only will Being Urban further understanding of the topography of citizenship in the Middle East and beyond, it will also contribute to answering one of today’s key questions: What Is A Good City?

Abu Dhabi’s urban development path contrasts sharply with its exuberant neighbour, Dubai. As Alamira Reem puts it, Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates since 1971, ‘has been quietly devising its own plans … to manifest its role and stature as a capital city’. Alamira Reem, a native Abu Dhabian and urban planner and researcher who has studied the emirate’s development for more than a decade, is uniquely placed to write its urban history. Following the introduction and description of Abu Dhabi’s early modern history, she focuses on three distinct periods dating from the discovery of oil in 1960, and coinciding with periods in power of the three rulers since then: Sheikh Shakhbut bin Sultan Al Nahyan (1960–1966), Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan (1966–2004), and Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan (2004–). Based on archival research, key interviews and spatial mapping, she analyses the different approaches of each ruler to development; investigates the role of planning consultants, architects, developers, construction companies and government agencies; examines the emergence of comprehensive development plans and the policies underlying them; and assesses the effects of these many and varied influences on Abu Dhabi’s development. She concludes that, while much still needs to be done, Abu Dhabi’s progress towards becoming a global, sustainable city provides lessons for cities elsewhere.

In Being Urban, Simon Goldhill and his team of outstanding urbanists explore the meaning of the urban condition, with particular reference to the Middle East. As Goldhill explains in his introduction, ‘What is a good city?’, five questions motivate the book:How can a city be systematically planned and yet maintain a possibility of flexibility, change, and the wellbeing of citizens?How does the city represent itself to itself, and image its past, its present and its future?What is it to dwell in, and experience, a city?How does violence erupt in and to a city, and what strategies of reconciliation and reconstruction can be employed?And finally, what is the relationship between the infrastructure of the city and the political process?Following the introduction, the twelve chapters are grouped into four sections: Engagement and Space; Infrastructure and Space; Conflict and Structures; and Curating the City. Through each chapter, the contributors reflect on aspects of urban infrastructure and culture, citizenship, belonging and exclusion, politics and conflict, with examples from across the Middle East, from Cairo to Tehran, Tel Aviv to Istanbul.Not only will Being Urban further understanding of the topography of citizenship in the Middle East and beyond, it will also contribute to answering one of today’s key questions: What Is A Good City?

Named one of the Top 10 books about council housing - the Guardian onlineBorn of idealism, and once an icon of the Labour movement and pillar of the Welfare State, council housing is now nearing its end. But do its many failings outweigh its positive contributions to public health and wellbeing?Alison Ravetz here provides the first comprehensive and apolitical history from which to arrive at a balanced judgement. Drawing on the widest possible evidence, from tenant and government records to the built environment itself, she tells the story of British council housing, from its seeds in Victorian reactions to 'the Poor', in philanthropy and model villages, Christian and other varieties of socialism. Her depiction of council housing in its mature years shows the often bizarre persistence of 'utopian' attitudes (whether in architectural design or management styles); its rise to a monopoly position in working-class family housing; the many compromises consequent on its state finance and local authority control; and the impact on working-class lives as an intellectuals' 'utopian dream' was converted into a social policy for the masses.

Named one of the Top 10 books about council housing - the Guardian onlineBorn of idealism, and once an icon of the Labour movement and pillar of the Welfare State, council housing is now nearing its end. But do its many failings outweigh its positive contributions to public health and wellbeing?Alison Ravetz here provides the first comprehensive and apolitical history from which to arrive at a balanced judgement. Drawing on the widest possible evidence, from tenant and government records to the built environment itself, she tells the story of British council housing, from its seeds in Victorian reactions to 'the Poor', in philanthropy and model villages, Christian and other varieties of socialism. Her depiction of council housing in its mature years shows the often bizarre persistence of 'utopian' attitudes (whether in architectural design or management styles); its rise to a monopoly position in working-class family housing; the many compromises consequent on its state finance and local authority control; and the impact on working-class lives as an intellectuals' 'utopian dream' was converted into a social policy for the masses.

Garden suburbs were the almost universal form of urban growth in the English-speaking world for most of the twentieth century. Their introduction was probably the most fundamental process of transformation in the physical form of the Western city since the Middle Ages.This book describes the ways in which these suburbs were created, particularly by private enterprise in England in the 1920s and 1930s, the physical forms they took, and how they have changed over time in response to social, economic and cultural change.Twentieth-Century Suburbs is concerned with the history, geography, architecture and planning of the ordinary suburban areas in which most British people live. It discusses the origins of suburbs; the ways in which they have been represented; the scale and causes of their growth; their form and architectural style; the landowners, builders and architects responsible for their creation; the changes they have undergone both physically and socially; and their impact on urban form and the implications for urban landscape management.

In this first comprehensive work in English to describe the building of Latin America's capital cities in the postcolonial period, Arturo Almandoz and his contributors demonstrate how Europe and France in particular shaped their culture, architecture and planning until the United States began to play a part in the 1930s.The book provides a new perspective on international planning.

The twentieth century witnessed an unprecedented increase in the number of capital cities worldwide – in 1900 there were only about forty, but by 2000 there were more than two hundred. And this, surely, is reason enough for a book devoted to the planning and development of capital cities in the twentieth century.However, the focus here is not only on recently created capitals. Indeed, the case studies which make up the core of the book show that, while very different, the development of London or Rome presents as great a challenge to planners and politicians as the design and building of Brasília or Chandigarh. Put simply, this book sets out to explore what makes capital cities different from other cities, why their planning is unique, and why there is such variety from one city to another.Sir Peter Hall’s ‘Seven Types of Capital City’ and Lawrence Vale’s ‘The Urban Design of Twentieth Century Capital Cities’ provide the setting for the fifteen case studies which follow – Paris, Moscow and St Petersburg, Helsinki, London, Tokyo, Washington, Canberra, Ottawa-Hull, Brasília, New Delhi, Berlin, Rome, Chandigarh, Brussels, New York. To bring the book to a close Peter Hall looks to the future of capital cities in the twenty-first century.For anyone with an interest in urban planning and design, architectural, planning and urban history, urban geography, or simply capital cities and why they are what they are, Planning Twentieth Century Capital Cities will be the key source book for a long time to come.

The export of American architecture began in the nineteenth century as a disjointed set of personal adventures and commercial initiatives. It continues today alongside the transfer of other aspects of American life and culture to most regions of the world. Jeffrey Cody explains how, why and where American architects, planners, building contractors and other actors have marketed American architecture overseas. In so doing he provides a historical perspective on the diffusion of American building technologies, architectural standards, construction methods and planning paradigms. Using previously undocumented examples and illustrations, he shows how steel-frame manufacturers shipped their products abroad enabling the erection of American-style skyscrapers worldwide by 1900 and how this phase was followed by similar initiatives by companies manufacturing concrete components.

Middle Eastern cities cannot be lumped together as a single group. Rather they make up the urban kaleidoscope of the title, as the diversity of the six cities included here shows. They range from cities rich in tradition (Cairo, Tunis, and Baghdad), to neglected cities (Algiers and Sana'a), to newly emerging 'oil-rich' Gulf cities (Dubai). The authors are all young Arab scholars and architects local to the cities they describe, providing an authentic voice with an understanding no outsider could achieve. These contributors move away from an exclusively 'Islamic' reading of Arab cities - which they regard as outdated and counterproductive. Instead, they explore issues of identity and globalization in the context of the struggles and solutions offered by each city from the late nineteenth century to the present day. Their focus is on how the built environment has changed over time and under different influences.

Describes the changing life of the city and its inhabitants during the final decades of the twentieth century and examines the complex forces at play in the search for modernity. The author presents us with four case studies of how the city is marketing and selling itself (including its refurbishment for the 2008 Olympic bid) and concludes that Beijing's urban image construction may provide an avenue for opposition groups to challenge the hegemony of those in power.

This is the first history of Stockholm’s development from the city’s unique seventeenth-century redevelopment and extension to the postmodern, postindustrial trends of today. While the city’s planners borrowed the ideas from abroad at certain periods, they provided the lead for the rest of the world at others. For much of the mid-twentieth century Stockholm was the model for Europe and elsewhere. Written by an acknowledged authority on the city and Swedish architecture and planning generally, with a wide range of illustrations, this book provides a much needed explanation of one of Europe’s great cities.

In this pioneering study of contemporary Chinese urban form, Duanfang Lu provides an analysis of how Chinese society constructed itself through the making and remaking of its built environment. She shows that as China’s quest for modernity created a perpetual scarcity as both a social reality and a national imagination, the realization of planning ideals was postponed. The work unit – the socialist enterprise or institute – gradually developed from workplace to social institution which integrated work, housing and social services. The Chinese city achieved a unique geography made up in large part of self-contained work units.Remaking Chinese Urban Form provides an important reference for academics and students conducting research on China. It will be a key source for courses on Asia in architecture, urban planning, geography, sociology and anthropology, at both the graduate and undergraduate level. The insightful yet accessible introduction to urban China will also be of interest to architects, urban designers and planners – as well as general audience who wish to learn about contemporary Chinese society.

Taipei's quest to become a global city is the key to its urban development. Globalizing Taipei looks at this "Asian Dragon", a major city in the South China Growth Triangle and a centre for transnational production, revealing how the development of this capital has received firm state support but is conditioned by international and domestic politics.The book is divided into four parts: economic and spatial restructuring, state and society realignment, social differentiation and cultural reorientation. Each analyzes the interaction of international, state and local politics in the shaping of the city's urban environment since World War II.All contributors to this edited volume are Taiwan scholars presenting critical insiders' views. Based on each author's specialization and research focus, each chapter provides an in-depth consideration of one of Taipei's developmental issues generated by globalization. Collectively they provide broad, insightful and coherent coverage of this crucial time in Taipei's global transmutation.

Clara Irazábal and her contributors explore the urban history of some of Latin America’s great cities through studies of their public spaces and what has taken place there. The avenues and plazas of Mexico City, Havana, Santo Domingo, Caracas, Bogotaì, SaÞo Paulo, Lima, Santiago, and Buenos Aires have been the backdrop for extraordinary, history-making events. While some argue that public spaces are a prerequisite for the expression, representation and reinforcement of democracy, they can equally be used in the pursuit of totalitarianism. Indeed, public spaces, in both the past and present, have been the site for the contestation by ordinary people of various stances on democracy and citizenship. By exploring the use and meaning of public spaces in Latin American cities, this book sheds light on contemporary definitions of citizenship and democracy in the Americas.

Today cities of the Arab world are subject to many of the same problems as other world cities, yet too often they are ignored in studies of urbanisation. This collection reveals the contrasts and similarities between older, traditional Arab cities and the newer oil-stimulated cities of the Gulf in their search for development and a place in the world order. The eight cities which form the core of the book – Rabat, Amman, Beirut, Kuwait, Manama, Doha, Abu Dhabi and Riyadh – provide a unique insight into today’s Middle Eastern city.Winner of The International Planning History Society (IPHS) Book Prize.

Urban codes have a profound influence on urban form, affecting the design and placement of buildings, streets and public spaces. Historically, their use has helped create some of our best-loved urban environments, while recent advances in coding have been a growing focus of attention, particularly in Britain and North America. However, the full potential for the role of codes has yet to be realized. In Urban Coding and Planning, Stephen Marshall and his contributors investigate the nature and scope of coding; its purposes; the kinds of environments it creates; and, perhaps most importantly, its relationship to urban planning.By bringing together historical and ongoing traditions of coding from around the world – with chapters describing examples from the United Kingdom, France, India, China, Japan, Australia, South Africa, the United States and Latin America – this book provides lessons for today’s theory and practice of place-making.

Urban codes have a profound influence on urban form, affecting the design and placement of buildings, streets and public spaces. Historically, their use has helped create some of our best-loved urban environments, while recent advances in coding have been a growing focus of attention, particularly in Britain and North America. However, the full potential for the role of codes has yet to be realized. In Urban Coding and Planning, Stephen Marshall and his contributors investigate the nature and scope of coding; its purposes; the kinds of environments it creates; and, perhaps most importantly, its relationship to urban planning.By bringing together historical and ongoing traditions of coding from around the world – with chapters describing examples from the United Kingdom, France, India, China, Japan, Australia, South Africa, the United States and Latin America – this book provides lessons for today’s theory and practice of place-making.

Yasser Elsheshtawy explores Dubai’s history from its beginnings as a small fishing village to its place on the world stage today, using historical narratives, travel descriptions, novels and fictional accounts by local writers to bring colour to his history of the city’s urban development.With the help of case studies and surveys this book explores the economic and political forces driving Dubai’s urban growth, its changing urbanity and its place within the global city network. Uniquely, it looks beyond the glamour of Dubai’s mega-projects, and provides an in-depth exploration of a select set of spaces which reveal the city’s ‘inner life’.

This book explores the planning and architectural histories of the cities across Central and Southeastern Europe transformed into the cultural and political capitals of the new nationstates created in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In their introduction, editors Makaš and Conley discuss the interrelated processes of nationalization, modernization, and Europeanization in the region at that time, with special attention paid to the way architectural and urban models from Western and Central Europe were adapted to fit the varying local physical and political contexts.Individual studies provide summaries of proposed and realized projects in fourteen cities.Each addresses the political and ideological aspects of the city’s urban history, including the idea of becoming a cultural and/or political capital as well as the relationship between national and urban development. The concluding chapter builds on the introductory argument about how the search for national identity combined with the pursuit of modernization and desire to be more European drove the development of these cities in the aftermath of empires.

Festivals have always been part of city life, but their relationship with their host cities has continually changed. With the rise of industrialization, they were largely considered peripheral to the course of urban affairs. Now they have become central to new ways of thinking about the challenges of economic and social change, as well as repositioning cities within competitive global networks. In this timely and thought-provoking book, John and Margaret Gold provide a reflective and evidence-based historical survey of the processes and actors involved, charting the ways that regular festivals have now become embedded in urban life and city planning.Beginning with David Garrick’s rain-drenched Shakespearean Jubilee and ending with Sydney’s flamboyant Mardi Gras celebrations, it encompasses the emergence and consolidation of city festivals. After a contextual historical survey that stretches from Antiquity to the late nineteenth century, there are detailed case studies of pioneering European arts festivals in their urban context: Venice’s Biennale, the Salzburg Festival, the Cannes Film Festival and Edinburgh’s International Festival. Ensuing chapters deal with the worldwide proliferation of arts festivals after 1950 and with the ever-increasing diversifycation of carnival celebrations, particularly through the actions of groups seeking to assert their identity. The conclusion draws together the book’s key themes and sketches the future prospects for festival cities.Lavishly illustrated, and copiously researched, this book is essential reading not just for urban geographers, social historians and planners, but also for anyone interested in contemporary festival and events tourism, urban events strategy, urban regeneration regeneration, or simply building a fuller understanding of the relationship between culture, planning and the city.

Festivals have always been part of city life, but their relationship with their host cities has continually changed. With the rise of industrialization, they were largely considered peripheral to the course of urban affairs. Now they have become central to new ways of thinking about the challenges of economic and social change, as well as repositioning cities within competitive global networks. In this timely and thought-provoking book, John and Margaret Gold provide a reflective and evidence-based historical survey of the processes and actors involved, charting the ways that regular festivals have now become embedded in urban life and city planning.Beginning with David Garrick’s rain-drenched Shakespearean Jubilee and ending with Sydney’s flamboyant Mardi Gras celebrations, it encompasses the emergence and consolidation of city festivals. After a contextual historical survey that stretches from Antiquity to the late nineteenth century, there are detailed case studies of pioneering European arts festivals in their urban context: Venice’s Biennale, the Salzburg Festival, the Cannes Film Festival and Edinburgh’s International Festival. Ensuing chapters deal with the worldwide proliferation of arts festivals after 1950 and with the ever-increasing diversifycation of carnival celebrations, particularly through the actions of groups seeking to assert their identity. The conclusion draws together the book’s key themes and sketches the future prospects for festival cities.Lavishly illustrated, and copiously researched, this book is essential reading not just for urban geographers, social historians and planners, but also for anyone interested in contemporary festival and events tourism, urban events strategy, urban regeneration regeneration, or simply building a fuller understanding of the relationship between culture, planning and the city.

This book investigates what the history of Hong Kong’s urban development has to teach other cities as they face environmental challenges, social and demographic change and the need for new models of dense urbanism. The authors describe how the high-rise intensity of Hong Kong came about; how the forest of towers are in fact vertical culs de sac; and how the city might become truly ‘volumetric’ with mixed activities through multiple levels and 3D movement networks incorporating ‘town cubes’ rather than town squares.For more information, visit the authors' website: http://www.makingofhk.com/makingofhk.swf

Knighted in 1998 ‘for services to the Town and Country Planning Association’, and in 2003 named by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II as a ‘Pioneer in the Life of the Nation’, Peter Hall is internationally renowned for the breadth and depth of his studies and writings on urban and regional planning. For the last 50 years, he has captured and helped to create the ‘planning imagination’.Here the editors have brought together in five themes a series of critical reflections on Peter’s vast and diverse contributions. Those reflections are provided by colleagues familiar with his work. The five parts are devoted to Peter Hall’s breadth of academic work, covering the history of cities and planning, London, spatial planning, connectivity and mobility, and urban globalization. Finally, as a sixth part, the editors have asked Peter Hall himself to reflect on his career and the sources of his imagination.The story this book tells is not one of a singular, totally consistent theoretical and philosophical view elaborated over several decades. Rather it covers a set of views that necessarily admits signs of Peter’s inconsistency and imperfection over the years – the insights and imperfections that inevitably accompany the exercise of a nonetheless remarkably fertile, restless and inspiring planning imagination.

Knighted in 1998 ‘for services to the Town and Country Planning Association’, and in 2003 named by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II as a ‘Pioneer in the Life of the Nation’, Peter Hall is internationally renowned for the breadth and depth of his studies and writings on urban and regional planning. For the last 50 years, he has captured and helped to create the ‘planning imagination’.Here the editors have brought together in five themes a series of critical reflections on Peter’s vast and diverse contributions. Those reflections are provided by colleagues familiar with his work. The five parts are devoted to Peter Hall’s breadth of academic work, covering the history of cities and planning, London, spatial planning, connectivity and mobility, and urban globalization. Finally, as a sixth part, the editors have asked Peter Hall himself to reflect on his career and the sources of his imagination.The story this book tells is not one of a singular, totally consistent theoretical and philosophical view elaborated over several decades. Rather it covers a set of views that necessarily admits signs of Peter’s inconsistency and imperfection over the years – the insights and imperfections that inevitably accompany the exercise of a nonetheless remarkably fertile, restless and inspiring planning imagination.

**Please note that the 2011 paperback is an exact reprint of the original hardback which was released in 1991**This book offers a detailed record of one of the world's oldest environmental pressure groups. It raises questions about the capacity of pressure groups to influence policy; and finally it assesses the campaing as a major factor in the emergence of modern town and planning, and as a backdrop against which to examine current issues.