William Whyte's Excerpts On The Social Life Of Small Urban Space

Furthermore, there are many literary pieces that emphasize and answer this question. Writer, architecture critic and urban area developer, Paul Goldberger, explores societies detachment in his essay Disconnected Urbanism. Frequently, his article is misconstrued as an antitechnology paper; however, this is not the case. He acknowledges the role that technology has played in misbalancing society. For example, another article states “community engagement is highly pertinent to social media. Engagement is perhaps the Holy Grail of social media; all brands, fan pages, and organizations’ pages strive to get a bigger share of customers’ attention and engagement in their pages”. Public spaces are defined by how people use and develop them. Will physical public spaces still matter if virtual ones take over? Goldberger main purpose in writing Disconnected Urbanism is to raise awareness of the neglect of public spaces and the communal opportunities that follow. “When a piece of geography is doing what it is supposed to do, it encourages you to feel a connection to it that, as in

In this YouTube video Mark Gorton has a talk with Charles Montgomery, journalist and the author of “Happy City” book. This book is mainly about ideas about livable streets movement. Their talk took place in Sara D. Roosevelt Park, New York. Mark Gorton points out that Charles Montgomery talks in his book about urban design in terms of happiness. That is a really unusual way of consideration urban planning and architecture. In Montgomery's opinion, people should build up cities and create public spaces with the final goal of joy and happiness. Charles Montgomery says that the key element of human happiness is social relationships, “strong, positive social connections”. The city itself becomes more successful when its residents have great social

Public spaces are social spaces where social phenomena happens, different activities leading to different social relations and interactions. Spaces with own rhythms of use and regulations that one can discover or rediscover in different cultural context.10 steven To understand how architecture can activate public spaces through play to make social spaces, spaces for public life, this paper first investigates how architecture defines the nature of a public spaces with the possibility of engaging public into play. Then, the paper discuss how play can engage people to redefine spaces and find something that have in common with others. And finally, how people can obtain their freedom through playing in a space will be explored. To do so, the

(Dorsey & Mulder, 2013) It increases “eyes on the streets” which sociologist, Jane Jacobs, believes is essential when re-thinking city spaces as they allow people to take care of each other. This BIA has a fair amount of people walking around tending to their everyday business. Because it is located near residential areas, it is not unusual to see small families exploring the BIA or people walking around at night which increases the efforts alongside vehicle traffic to lower the chances of something wrong, such as a crime, from occurring in the

Cities are generators of economic life and source of changes in the world. Thereby, Jane Jacobs in her book The Death and Life of Great American Cities puts into relief the role of cities on the social and economic levels, while denouncing the disastrous consequences of urban renewal programs. To that extent, in chapters 2 and 3, she discusses "The Uses of Sidewalks”, arguing that over all people need safety and trust in their city. Therefore, first she claims the necessity of keeping streets and sidewalks safe because they are the “vital organs” of cities (29). Secondly, she argues that the functioning of cities should be organized in order to foster human interaction in which “casual public

As the world’s population continue to migrate and live in urban areas, planners, engineers, and politicians have an important responsibilities to ensure that they are livable and sustainable. But what defines an urban area, and what makes it so attractive? In my opinion, urban area are places that consists of a variety of land uses and buildings. Places where services and amenities are easily accessible to the general public, with an efficient multimodal (i.e. rail, vehicles, bikes, public transit, walking and etc.) established transportation network. As well, it should be a place where people can play, learn, work, and grow in a healthy, safe, and collaborative manner. Based on that definition, the novel, Parable of the Sower

In the center of this intersections situates a triangular grassy space. It is a dead-zone, a void that has no functionality other than to be used as a medium for pedestrian crossing. It is not a third space, because no one wants to converse on its grounds; it is not a recreational space, because the space is not welcoming. It is too loud from the surrounding traffic. The space is too small for comfortable gathering, too transparent, and too inaccessible. There is opportunity for development on this land, but the lack of amenities in the surround area means that it will never be as popular as a courtyard plaza or a

Throughout the world of suburbia, there seems to be a persistence of communities who attempt to create a perfect, enclosed world for the whole of the community to live in. By providing for everything that the inhabitants would ever want, suburbia is able to close itself off from those around it that it deems unworthy of belonging. While this exclusivity helps to foster the sense of community, it can also bring with it isolation from the outside, and also from within, and have disastrous results. Throughout the semester, there have been a number of works that have dealt the issue of isolation, but the greatest representation of a work whose physical qualities in its representation of suburbia help to

The Urban Age is the current age where we are living now as the majority of human population is living within an urban settlement or urban environment such as cities, towns and slums. With the rapid increase of urbanization, the demand for private and public spaces is growing. Private spaces falls under things such as houses, apartment and office spaces. Whilst while the public are things such as public municipal parks, public malls and community oval. The issue that is being shined upon in this essay within our current cities spaces is the ever growing privatization of public spaces. Bradley L Garret a journalist for the guardian wrote an article on how cities such as Los Angeles has become a victim of this and he emphasizes the fact that

Urbanism it’s a great concept, it brings people back to what towns used to be. Neighbors interacting with neighbor’s people being part of a community. Celebration Florida, is a beautiful place to live and it seemed to be so perfect that some people felt it was too perfect. An article written by Ed Pilkington in 2010, discussed how the Disney dream died in Celebration. However the idea of a place that creates an environment where people interact and are involved with their community does not mean that bad things could never happen. People are people after all. In Celebration or any other community for that matter they are not immune to life. Foreclosures and crime happen even in the best communities. To think that these things could never happen

The recent resurgence of interest in the introduction of ecology back into urban areas serves as evidence to support the claim that wilderness exists as the constant. As humans attempt get back in touch with nature, we actually continue to distance ourselves from wilderness. We attempt to fit nature into the spaces convenient for us, as we continue to expand our urban areas, instead of allowing it thrive in its own environment. Timothy Morton asserts, “Putting something called Nature on a pedestal and admiring it from afar does for the environment what patriarchy does for the figure of Woman. It is a paradoxical act of sadistic admiration” (5). In other words, scattering “green spaces” and “wilderness encounters” throughout cities, acts to oppress the true wilderness. In Abbey’s text, Seldom Seen Smith functions to oppose these urban wilderness experiences. Smith’s touring business does not function as a “get rich quick” scheme characteristic of capitalistic urbanites who seek offer an idealized wilderness adventure to their customers.

The contribution of this project to practices or a wider field of study will be positioned as an open exploration to expand the understandings of the human dimension in public space. Further, it aligns with the argument to situate city space to return the embodiment of physicality and senses of the human body. Lastly, the project purposes as an open discussion and new perceptions towards pedestrians or practices, to participate and discover innumerable potentialities for the future public

The streets of ancient cities and today’s modern metropolis have changed the way people interact and live within the city. Although streets go unnoticed and their functions are taken for granted, they significantly impact our way of living in many modes that leave a lasting impression on the city’s urban plan.

The privatization and fragmentation of space in post-industrial urban America is a widespread social problem. As society becomes even more globalized as a result of technological advances, the rampant spread of a privatized public realm is ever-increasing. Public space is needed as a center in which to bring people together to share a common place. It is within public spaces that public life unfolds and without public spaces such as parks, streets, and buildings, the mixing of classes will become increasingly uncommon. Society is made up of two sectors: the private and public, and it is essential that both remain separate entities. However, through the use of fear tactics especially the threat of

Public spaces; such as; parks, trails, squares, and plazas are the art of creating an urban life, they are considered as a reflection of community's usage, identity, and character (Violich, 1985). Jeddah, as an Arabian City, has a unique social image for its reactional activities, it is required being considered in public's spaces' design (Pinilla, 2010). Creating identity in public space is a very critical issue; especially; in a deep-rooted community, whereas designing characters and traits requires applying certain inherited spirit in light of the contemporary image.