Urban Planning and City Structure: Key Concepts Explained

Urban Fabric and City Structure

Buildings are an essential part of the urban landscape. The urban plot is the method used to group and organize buildings within a city, forming streets. This structure has undergone many changes throughout history, primarily driven by transportation needs.

Types of Urban Layouts

• Closed Order: Buildings are aligned wall-to-wall, forming large blocks. This is prevalent in older neighborhoods where land is expensive or scarce.
• Open Order: Buildings are insulated from each other and separated by spaces, often including green areas. This is dominant in post-industrial residential zones where land is relatively affordable.

The urban fabric depends on the city site, the characteristics of the buildings, and the economic resources available to meet the needs of inhabitants.

Urban Transformations and Renewal

In many ancient cities, the urban fabric is being destroyed and replaced. Urban renewal can be driven by aging or dilapidated buildings, natural catastrophes, war, or purely speculative public interests. Sometimes, institutions carry out the redevelopment of entire areas. Currently, most municipalities tend to rehabilitate and modify the old urban fabric, as it is the only way to maintain residential neighborhoods that possess historical heritage value.

Key Urban Concepts

• Conurbation: The union of several towns with interrelated economic and trade ties, lacking physical discontinuity, yet maintaining their own administrative structures. Cities join in space due to mutual growth.
• Garden City: A city model devised by Howard in the second half of the 20th century. It was a utopian solution designed to resolve urban problems generated by industrialization and exorbitant city growth.
• Bedroom Community: A localized area on the outskirts of a city, within the metropolitan area, serving a purely residential function and characterized by daily commuting.
• Metropolitan Area: An integrated market featuring shared services such as transport, health, and infrastructure networks, arising from the influence of a central city on a region.
• Business Center: The oldest part of town, often corresponding to the pre-industrial city that was once surrounded by walls. It typically features a disordered street plan located where the old walls and closed edifices once stood.
• Suburban: A peripheral area of the city. While often characterized by poor housing quality, in England, the term can conversely refer to high-quality residential areas.