Tigran H | Urban Form and Human Behavior in Context of Livable Cities and their Public Realms
Introduction
In what ways are cities things that happen to us, and in what ways are cities things we do together, with more or less art and purpose? How do we understand both the geometries of cities and the ways that form might be connected-or not-to their social organization and politics? These are some of the reasons and potential lacunas in research which need for a cross-disciplinary approach related to urban form and social behavior and a revamped effort at uniting the disciplines of the built environment and behavioral sciences. The remarkable link between intrinsic human qualities such as behavior, conduct, and demeanor, and the external environment has been recognized for years. However, this link has not been given much consideration in the design of our built environment. This needs to change as architecture, urban planning & design are crucial for achieving true urban sustainability in our cities. Environmental psychology applies social science methods and theories to real world questions about human experience in everyday physical environments. Unlike the normative approach, it seeks to describe the world the way it is-how we use it and, in turn, how it affects our behavior-to build a knowledge base for urban design. Through a multilevel, multidisciplinary, social and spatial environmental approach we will examine relationships between characteristics of the physical environment, humans, context and human responses. It will be an evolving knowledge base for urban design decisions. There are significant reasons why planning and designing the city is so important today, maybe more than ever before. The most crucial one is that current urban development and urban living patterns are characterized by fast flows of capital, media, transport and multitasking. These are time-technology patterns are today regarded by many as ultimately unsustainable because of the destructive burden they place on the environment. One of the causes for this destructive influence is believed to be the contemporary city’s very form and structure, which urgently requires improvement. This in turn highlights the vital role of urban planning and urban design. It is therefore essential to spell out the significant contribution urban planning and design can and should make towards sustainable urban development and social life by fully understanding the consequences if and improving the city’s form and structure. The city’s most important advantages are often said to be that it offers choice, an exciting lifestyle; it provides access to services and facilities; it has stimulating features and represents an intellectual challenge; and it offers workplaces. However, all cities are different and some offer their citizens more advantages than do others. It is the main objective of good urban planning and design to create new advantages or enhance the existing advantages a ‘good’ city and ‘good urbanity’ has to offer.
Tigran H Articles from Lupine Publishers:
The Urban
Form and Human Behavior research within disciplines of the built environment
sets out to investigate and discusses issues of urban form and its connection
to social life and human behavior to provide insights and frameworks to support
sustainable, livable and flourishing cities. The idea is to revive behavior
based urban research, focusing on public space and human well-being arguing for
the importance to acknowledging the importance of places over objects, and
collaborations between disciplines. There is an intricate link between city
structure and the possibilities for public life. As Christopher Alexander
pointed out, ‘A Millennia of Research findings’ and evidence-based material
that just needs to be excavated and applied in a proper way [1]. The challenge
for this field and research is to map and spot as well as study the urban form
and content and its connection to social processes; to excavate and sort all
the results and findings of previous theoretical and practical work of
architects, planners, human geographers, environmental psychologists,
ethnologists, ecologists, historians, and others that has relevance in this
field. In urban planning and design research and practice there is a broad
understanding that design of the built environment matters to the life and
well-being of communities and individuals. Opinions differ markedly, however,
on what role such environments play in influencing behavior, especially as they
might contribute to desirable social ends. While the historian John Archer
argued that architecture and urbanism structure human behavior [2], Sociologist
Herbert Gans believed that architecture and urbanism cannot solve society and
its problems through design [3]. As to find a balance of those opposing views
one must dwell into these issues of urban form and social life i.e. the
well-being of people together with climate change and energy issues that are on
the top of the agenda. Aside from the fact that human behavior and social life
are part and being shaped by a complex web of other economic, political,
cultural, ethnic and other links and prerequisites, it is hard not to agree
that the built environment plays an important role in that also. Urban design
Professor Chuck Bohl sees this in a way that design can shape spaces to afford
opportunities for positive social activities, a type of ‘environmental
affordance’[4]. Moving beyond the environmental determinism, i.e. believing
that urban environment decides or changes social behavior, one cannot avoid not
to assert, that if the built environment does not afford a desirable behavior,
the behavior cannot really take place at all as discussed by [5,6]. Coupled to
that, John Archer’s statement finds even more fertile ground when we look from
the other corner and assert, from the fact that the more processes are
understood, the better the architecture and urbanism can serve human needs.
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