![[BACK]](/cvsweb/icons/back.gif){kind=icon}
Return to history.html CVS log ![[TXT]](/cvsweb/icons/text.gif){kind=icon}
![[DIR]](/cvsweb/icons/dir.gif){kind=icon}
Up to [Micropolis - Activity] / micropolis / manual|
Return to history.html CVS log | Up to [Micropolis - Activity] / micropolis / manual |
1.1 root 1: <head><title>History Of Cities And City Planning</title></head><body>
2:
3: <h1>History Of Cities And City Planning</h1>
4:
5: <h1>By Cliff Ellis</h1>
6:
7: <h2>Introduction</h2>
8:
9: The building of cities has a long and complex history. Although city
10: planning as an organized profession has existed for less than a
11: century, all cities display various degrees of forethought and
12: conscious design in their layout and functioning. <p>
13:
14: Early humans led a nomadic existence, relying on hunting and gathering
15: for sustenance. Between 8,000 and 10,000 years ago, systematic
16: cultivation of plants and the domestication of animals allowed for
17: more permanent settlements. During the fourth millennium B.C., the
18: requirements for the "urban revolution" were finally met: the
19: production of a surplus of storable food, a system of writing, a more
20: complex social organization, and technological advances such as the
21: plough, potter's wheel, loom, and metallurgy. <p>
22:
23: Cities exist for many reasons, and the diversity of urban forms can be
24: traced to the complex functions that cities perform. Cities serve as
25: centers of storage, trade, and manufacture. The agricultural surplus
26: from the surrounding countryside is processed and distributed in
27: cities. Cities also grew up around marketplaces, where goods from
28: distant places could be exchanged for local products. Throughout
29: history, cities have been founded at the intersections of
30: transportation routes, or at points where goods must shift from one
31: mode of transportation to another, as at river and ocean ports. <p>
32:
33: Religious elements have been crucial throughout urban history. Ancient
34: peoples had sacred places, often associated with cemeteries or
35: shrines, around which cities grew. Ancient cities usually had large
36: temple precincts with monumental religious buildings. Many medieval
37: cities were built near monasteries and cathedrals. <p>
38:
39: Cities often provide protection in a precarious world. During attacks,
40: the rural populace could flee behind city walls, where defence forces
41: assembled to repel the enemy. The wall served this purpose for
42: millennia, until the invention of heavy artillery rendered walls
43: useless in warfare. With the advent of modern aerial warfare, cities
44: have become prime targets for destruction rather than safe havens.
45: <p>
46:
47: Cities serve as centers of government. In particular, the emergence of
48: the great nation-states of Europe between 1400 and 1800 led to the
49: creation of new capital cities or the investing of existing cities
50: with expanded governmental functions. <p>
51:
52: Washington, D.C., for example, displays the monumental buildings,
53: radial street pattern, and large public spaces typical of capital
54: cities. <p>
55:
56: Cities, with their concentration of talent, mixture of peoples, and
57: economic surplus, have provided a fertile ground for the evolution of
58: human culture: the arts, scientific research, and technical
59: innovation. They serve as centers of communication, where new ideas
60: and information are spread to the surrounding territory and to foreign
61: lands. <p>
62:
63: <h2>Constraints on City Form</h2>
64:
65: Cities are physical artifacts inserted into a preexisting natural
66: world, and natural constraints must be respected if a settlement is to
67: survive and prosper. Cities must conform to the landscape in which
68: they are located, although technologies have gradually been developed
69: to reorganize the land to suit human purposes. Moderately sloping land
70: provides the best urban site, but spectacular effects have been
71: achieved on hilly sites such as San Francisco, Rio de Janeiro, and
72: Athens. <p>
73:
74: Climate influences city form. For example, streets have been aligned
75: to take advantage of cooling breezes, and arcades designed to shield
76: pedestrians from sun and rain. The architecture of individual
77: buildings often reflects adaptations to temperature, rainfall, snow,
78: wind and other climatic characteristics. <p>
79:
80: Cities must have a healthy water supply, and locations along rivers
81: and streams, or near underground watercourses, have always been
82: favored. Many large modern cities have outgrown their local water
83: supplies and rely upon distant water sources diverted by elaborate
84: systems of pipes and canals. <p>
85:
86: City location and internal structure have been profoundly influenced
87: by natural transportation routes. Cities have often been sited near
88: natural harbors, on navigable rivers, or along land routes determined
89: by regional topography. <p>
90:
91: Finally, cities have had to survive periodic natural disasters such as
92: earthquakes, hurricanes, tornados, and floods. The San Francisco
93: earthquake of 1906 demonstrated how natural forces can undo decades of
94: human labor in a very short time. <p>
95:
96: <h2>Elements of Urban Structure</h2>
97:
98: City planners must weave a complex, ever-changing array of elements
99: into a working whole: that is the perennial challenge of city
100: planning. The physical elements of the city can be divided into three
101: categories: networks, buildings, and open spaces. Many alternative
102: arrangements of these components have been tried throughout history,
103: but no ideal city form has ever been agreed upon. Lively debates about
104: the best way to arrange urban anatomies continue to rage, and show no
105: signs of abating. <p>
106:
107: <h3>Networks</h3>
108:
109: Every modern city contains an amazing array of pathways to carry flows
110: of people, goods, water, energy, and information. Transportation
111: networks are the largest and most visible of these. Ancient cities
112: relied on streets, most of them quite narrow by modern standards, to
113: carry foot traffic and carts. The modern city contains a complex
114: hierarchy of transportation channels, ranging from ten-lane freeways
115: to sidewalks. In the United States, the bulk of trips are carried by
116: the private automobile, with mass transit a distant second. American
117: cities display the low-density sprawl characteristic of auto-centered
118: urban development. In contrast, many European cities have the high
119: densities necessary to support rail transit. <p>
120:
121: Modern cities rely on complex networks of utilities. When cities were
122: small, obtaining pure water and disposing of wastes was not a major
123: problem, but cities with large populations and high densities require
124: expensive public infrastructure. During the nineteenth century, rapid
125: urban growth and industrialization caused overcrowding, pollution, and
126: disease in urban areas. After the connection between impure water and
127: disease was established, American and European cities began to install
128: adequate sewer and water systems. Since the late nineteenth century,
129: cities have also been laced with wires and conduits carrying
130: electricity, gas, and communications signals. <p>
131:
132: <h3>Buildings</h3>
133:
134: Buildings are the most visible elements of the city, the features that
135: give each city its unique character. Residential structures occupy
136: almost half of all urban land, with the building types ranging from
137: scattered single-family homes to dense high-rise apartments.
138: Commercial buildings are clustered downtown and at various subcenters,
139: with skyscrapers packed into the central business district and
140: low-rise structures prevailing elsewhere, although tall buildings are
141: becoming more common in the suburbs. Industrial buildings come in many
142: forms ranging from large factory complexes in industrial districts to
143: small workshops. <p>
144:
145: City planners engage in a constant search for the proper arrangement
146: of these different types of land use, paying particular attention to
147: the compatibility of different activities, population densities,
148: traffic generation, economic efficiency, social relationships, and the
149: height and bulk of buildings. <p>
150:
151: <h3>Open Spaces</h3>
152:
153: Open space is sometimes treated as a leftover, but it contributes
154: greatly to the quality of urban life. "Hard" spaces such as plazas,
155: malls, and courtyards provide settings for public activities of all
156: kinds. "Soft" spaces such as parks, gardens, lawns, and nature
157: preserves provide essential relief from harsh urban conditions and
158: serve as space for recreational activities. These "amenities"
159: increasingly influence which cities will be perceived as desirable
160: places to live. <p>
161:
162: <h2>Evolution of Urban Form</h2>
163:
164: The first true urban settlements appeared around 3,000 B.C. in ancient
165: Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Indus Valley. Ancient cities displayed
166: both "organic" and "planned" types of urban form. These societies had
167: elaborate religious, political, and military hierarchies. Precincts
168: devoted to the activities of the elite were often highly planned and
169: regular in form. In contrast, residential areas often grew by a slow
170: process of accretion, producing complex, irregular patterns that we
171: term "organic." Two typical features of the ancient city are the wall
172: and the citadel: the wall for defense in regions periodically swept by
173: conquering armies, and the citadel -- a large, elevated precinct
174: within the city -- devoted to religious and state functions. <p>
175:
176: Greek cities did not follow a single pattern. Cities growing slowly
177: from old villages often had an irregular, organic form, adapting
178: gradually to the accidents of topography and history. Colonial cities,
179: however, were planned prior to settlement using the grid system. The
180: grid is easy to lay out, easy to comprehend, and divides urban land
181: into uniform rectangular lots suitable for development. <p>
182:
183: The Romans engaged in extensive city-building activities as they
184: consolidated their empire. Rome itself displayed the informal
185: complexity created by centuries of organic growth, although particular
186: temple and public districts were highly planned. In contrast, the
187: Roman military and colonial towns were laid out in a variation of the
188: grid. Many European cities, like London and Paris, sprang from these
189: Roman origins. <p>
190:
191: We usually associate medieval cities with narrow winding streets
192: converging on a market square with a cathedral and city hall. Many
193: cities of this period display this pattern, the product of thousands
194: of incremental additions to the urban fabric. However, new towns
195: seeded throughout undeveloped regions of Europe were based upon the
196: familiar grid. In either case, large encircling walls were built for
197: defense against marauding armies; new walls enclosing more land were
198: built as the city expanded and outgrew its former container. <p>
199:
200: During the Renaissance, architects began to systematically study the
201: shaping of urban space, as though the city itself were a piece of
202: architecture that could be given an aesthetically pleasing and
203: functional order. Many of the great public spaces of Rome and other
204: Italian cities date from this era. Parts of old cities were rebuilt to
205: create elegant squares, long street vistas, and symmetrical building
206: arrangements. Responding to advances in firearms during the fifteenth
207: century, new city walls were designed with large earthworks to deflect
208: artillery, and star-shaped points to provide defenders with sweeping
209: lines of fire. Spanish colonial cities in the New World were built
210: according to rules codified in the Laws of the Indies of 1573,
211: specifying an orderly grid of streets with a central plaza, defensive
212: wall, and uniform building style. <p>
213:
214: We associate the baroque city with the emergence of great
215: nation-states between 1600 and 1750. Ambitious monarchs constructed
216: new palaces, courts, and bureaucratic offices. The grand scale was
217: sought in urban public spaces: long avenues, radial street networks,
218: monumental squares, geometric parks and gardens. Versailles is a clear
219: expression of this city-building model; Washington, D.C. is an example
220: from the United States. Baroque principles of urban design were used
221: by Baron Haussmann in his celebrated restructuring of Paris between
222: 1853 and 1870. Haussmann carved broad new thoroughfares through the
223: tangled web of old Parisian streets, linking major subcenters of the
224: city with one another in a pattern which has served as a model for
225: many other modernization plans. <p>
226:
227: Toward the latter half of the eighteenth century, particularly in
228: America, the city as a setting for commerce assumed primacy. The
229: buildings of the bourgeoisie expand along with their owners'
230: prosperity: banks, office buildings, warehouses, hotels, and small
231: factories. New towns founded during this period were conceived as
232: commercial enterprises, and the neutral grid was the most effective
233: means to divide land up into parcels for sale. The city became a
234: checkerboard on which players speculated on shifting land values. No
235: longer would religious, political, and cultural imperatives shape
236: urban development; rather, the market would be allowed to determine
237: the pattern of urban growth. New York, Philadelphia, and Boston around
238: 1920 exemplify the commercial city of this era, with their bustling,
239: mixed-use waterfront districts. <p>
240:
241: <h2>Transition to the Industrial City</h2>
242:
243: Cities have changed more since the Industrial Revolution than in all
244: the previous centuries of their existence. New York had a population
245: of about 313,000 in 1840 but had reached 4,767,000 in 1910. Chicago
246: exploded from 4.000 to 2,185,000 during the same period. Millions of
247: rural dwellers no longer needed on farms flocked to the cities, where
248: new factories churned out products for the new markets made accessible
249: by railroads and steamships. In the United States, millions of
250: immigrants from Europe swelled the urban populations. Increasingly,
251: urban economies were being woven more rightly into the national and
252: international economies. <p>
253:
254: Technological innovations poured forth, many with profound impacts on
255: urban form. Railroad tracks were driven into the heart of the city.
256: Internal rail transportation systems greatly expanded the radius of
257: urban settlement: horsecars beginning in the 1830s, cable cars in the
258: 1870s, and electric trolleys in the 1880s. In the 1880s, the first
259: central power plants began providing electrical power to urban areas.
260: The rapid communication provided by the telegraph and the telephone
261: allowed formerly concentrated urban activities to disperse across a
262: wider field. <p>
263:
264: The industrial city still focused on the city center, which contained
265: both the central business district, defined by large office buildings,
266: and substantial numbers of factory and warehouse structures. Both
267: trolleys and railroad systems converged on the center of the city,
268: which boasted the premier entertainment and shopping establishments.
269: The working class lived in crowded districts close to the city center,
270: near their place of employment. <p>
271:
272: Early American factories were located outside of major cities along
273: rivers which provided water power for machinery. After steam power
274: became widely available in the 1930s, factories could be located
275: within the city in proximity to port facilities, rail lines, and the
276: urban labor force. Large manufacturing zones emerged within the major
277: northeastern and midwestern cities such as Pittsburgh, Detroit, and
278: Cleveland. But by the late nineteenth century, factory
279: decentralization had already begun, as manufacturers sought larger
280: parcels of land away from the congestion of the city. Gary, Indiana,
281: for example, was founded in 1906 on the southern shore of Lake
282: Michigan by the United States Steel Company. <p>
283:
284: The increasing crowding, pollution, and disease in the central city
285: produced a growing desire to escape to a healthier environment in the
286: suburbs. The upper classes had always been able to retreat to homes in
287: the countryside. Beginning in the 1830s, commuter railroads enabled
288: the upper middle class to commute in to the city center. Horsecar
289: lines were built in many cities between the 1830s and 1880s, allowing
290: the middle class to move out from the central cities into more
291: spacious suburbs. Finally, during the 1890s electric trolleys and
292: elevated rapid transit lines proliferated, providing cheap urban
293: transportation for the majority of the population. <p>
294:
295: The central business district of the city underwent a radical
296: transformation with the development of the skyscraper between 1870 and
297: 1900. These tall buildings were not technically feasible until the
298: invention of the elevator and steel-frame construction methods.
299: Skyscrapers reflect the dynamics of the real estate market; the tall
300: building extracts the maximum economic value from a limited parcel of
301: land. These office buildings housed the growing numbers of
302: white-collar employees in banking, finance, management, and business
303: services, all manifestations of the shift from an economy of small
304: firms to one of large corporations. <p>
305:
306: <h3>The Form of the Modern City
307: in the Age of the Automobile</h3>
308:
309: The city of today may be divided into two parts: <p>
310:
311: <ul>
312:
313: <li>An inner zone, coextensive with the boundaries of the old industrial city.
314:
315: <li>Suburban areas, dating from the 1920s, which have been designed for the automobile from the beginning.
316:
317: </ul>
318:
319: The central business districts of American cities have become centers
320: of information processing, finance, and administration rather than
321: manufacturing. White-collar employees in these economic sectors
322: commute in from the suburbs on a network of urban freeways built
323: during the 1950s and 1960s; this "hub-and-wheel" freeway pattern can
324: be observed on many city maps. New bridges have spanned rivers and
325: bays, as in New York and San Francisco, linking together formerly
326: separate cities into vast urbanized regions. <p>
327:
328: Waves of demolition and rebuilding have produced "Manhattanized"
329: downtowns across the land. During the 1950s and 1960s, urban renewal
330: programs cleared away large areas of the old city, releasing the land
331: for new office buildings, convention centers, hotels, and sports
332: complexes. Building surges have converted the downtowns of American
333: cities into forests of tall office buildings. More recently, office
334: functions not requiring a downtown location have been moved to huge
335: office parks in the suburbs. <p>
336:
337: Surrounding the central business area lies a large band of old
338: mixed-use and residential buildings which hose the urban poor. High
339: crime, low income, deteriorating services, inadequate housing, and
340: intractable social problems plague these neglected areas of urban
341: America. The manufacturing jobs formerly available to inner city
342: residents are no longer there, and resources have not been committed
343: to replace them. <p>
344:
345: These inner city areas have been left behind by a massive migration to
346: the suburbs, which began in the late nineteenth century but
347: accelerated in the 1920s with the spread of the automobile. Freeway
348: building after World War II opened up even larger areas of suburban
349: land, which were quickly filled by people fleeing central city
350: decline. Today, more people live in suburbs than in cities proper.
351: Manufacturers have also moved their production facilities to suburban
352: locations which have freeway and rail accessibility. <p>
353:
354: Indeed, we have reached a new stage of urbanization beyond the
355: metropolis. Most major cities are no longer focused exclusively on the
356: traditional downtown. New subcenters have arisen round the periphery,
357: and these subcenters supply most of the daily needs of their adjacent
358: populations. The old metropolis has become a multi-centered urban
359: region. In turn, many of these urban regions have expanded to the
360: point where they have coalesced into vast belts of urbanization --
361: what the geographer Jean Gottman termed "megalopolis." The prime
362: example is the eastern seaboard of the United States from Boston to
363: Washington. The planner C.A. Doxiadis has speculated that similar vast
364: corridors of urbanization will appear throughout the world during the
365: next century. Thus far, American planners have not had much success in
366: imposing a rational form on this process. However, New Town and
367: greenbelt programs in Britain and the Scandinavian countries have, to
368: some extent, prevented formless sprawl from engulfing the countryside.
369: <p>
370:
371: <h3>The Economics of Urban Areas</h3>
372:
373: Since the 1950s, city planners have increasingly paid attention to the
374: economics of urban areas. When many American cities experienced fiscal
375: crises during the 1970s, urban financial management assumed even
376: greater importance. Today, planners routinely assess the economic
377: consequences of all major changes in the form of the city. <p>
378:
379: Several basic concepts underlie urban and regional economic analysis.
380: First, cities cannot grow if their residents simply provide services
381: for one another. The city must create products which can be sold to an
382: external purchaser, bringing in money which can be reinvested in new
383: production facilities and raw materials. This "economic base" of
384: production for external markets is crucial. Without it, the economic
385: engine of the city grinds to a halt. <p>
386:
387: Once the economic base is established, an elaborate internal market
388: can evolve. This market includes the production of goods and services
389: for businesses and residents within the city. Obviously, a large part
390: of the city's physical plant is devoted to facilities for internal
391: transactions: retail stores of all kinds, restaurants, local
392: professional services, and so on. <p>
393:
394: Modern cities are increasingly engaged in competition for economic
395: resources such as industrial plants, corporate headquarters,
396: high-technology firms, and government facilities. Cities try to lure
397: investment with an array of features: low tax rates, improved
398: transportation and utility infrastructure, cheap land, and skilled
399: labor force. Amenities such as climate, proximity to recreation,
400: parks, elegant architecture, and cultural activities influence the
401: location decisions of businesses and individuals. Many older cities
402: have difficulty surviving in this new economic game. Abandoned by
403: traditional industries, they're now trying to create a new economic
404: base involving growth sectors such as high technology. <p>
405:
406: Today, cities no longer compete in mere regional or national markets:
407: the market is an international one. Multinational firms close plants
408: in Chicago or Detroit and build replacements in Asia or Latin America.
409: Foreign products dominate whole sectors of the American consumer goods
410: market. Huge sums of money shift around the globe in instantaneous
411: electronic transactions. Cities must struggle for survival in a
412: volatile environment in which the rules are always changing. This
413: makes city planning even more challenging than before. <p>
414:
415: <h2>Modern City Planning</h2>
416:
417: Modern city planning can be divided into two distinct but related
418: types of planning. visionary city planning proposes radical changes in
419: the form of the city, often in conjunction with sweeping changes in
420: the social and economic order. Institutionalized city planning is
421: lodged within the existing structures of government, and modifies
422: urban growth processes in moderate, pragmatic ways. It is constrained
423: by the prevailing alignment of political and economic forces within
424: the city. <p>
425:
426: <h3>Visionary or Utopian City Planning</h3>
427:
428: People have imagined ideal cities for millennia. Plato's Republic was
429: an ideal city, although lacking in the spatial detail of later
430: schemes. Renaissance architects designed numerous geometric cities,
431: and ever since architects have been the chief source of imaginative
432: urban proposals. In the twentieth century, Le Corbusier, Frank Lloyd
433: Wright, Paolo Soleri, and dozens of other architects have designed
434: cities on paper. Although few have been realized in pure form, they
435: have influenced the layout of many new towns and urban redevelopment
436: projects. <p>
437:
438: In his "Contemporary City for Three Million People" of 1922 and
439: "Radiant City" of 1935, Le Corbusier advocated a high-density urban
440: alternative, with skyscraper office buildings and mid-rise apartments
441: placed within park-like open spaces. Different land uses were located
442: in separate districts, forming a rigid geometric pattern with a
443: sophisticated system of superhighways and rail transit. <p>
444:
445: Frank Lloyd Wright envisioned a decentralized low-density city in
446: keeping with his distaste for large cities and belief in frontier
447: individualism. The Broadacre City plan of 1935 is a large grid of
448: arterials spread across the countryside, with most of the internal
449: space devoted to single-family homes on large lots. Areas are also
450: carefully set aside for small farms, light industry, orchards,
451: recreation areas, and other urban facilities. A network of
452: superhighways knits the region together, so spatially dispersed
453: facilities are actually very close in terms of travel time. In many
454: ways, Wright's Broadacre City resembles American suburban and exurban
455: developments of the post-WWII period. <p>
456:
457: Many other utopian plans could be catalogued, but the point is that
458: planners and architects have generated a complex array of urban
459: patterns from which to draw ideas and inspiration. Most city planners,
460: however, do not work on a blank canvas; they can only make incremental
461: changes to an urban scene already shaped by a complicated historical
462: process. <p>
463:
464: <h3>Institutionalized City Planning</h3>
465:
466: The form of the city is determined primarily by thousands of private
467: decisions to construct buildings, within a framework of public
468: infrastructure and regulations administered by the city, state, and
469: federal governments. City planning actions can have enormous impacts
470: on land values. From the point of view of land economics, the city is
471: an enormous playing field on which thousands of competitors struggle
472: to capture value by constructing or trading land and buildings. The
473: goal of city planning is to intervene in this game in order to protect
474: widely shared public values such as health, safety, environmental
475: quality, social equality, and aesthetics. <p>
476:
477: The roots of American city planning lie in an array of reform efforts
478: of the late nineteenth century: the Parks movement, the City Beautiful
479: movement, campaigns for housing regulations, the Progressive movement
480: for government reform, and efforts to improve public health through
481: the provision of sanitary sewers and clean water supplies. The First
482: National Conference on City Planning occurred in 1909, the same year
483: as Daniel Burnham's famous Plan of Chicago. That date may be used to
484: mark the inauguration of the new profession. The early city planners
485: actually came from diverse backgrounds such as architecture, landscape
486: architecture, engineering, and law, but they shared a common desire to
487: produce a more orderly urban pattern. <p>
488:
489: The zoning of land became, and still is, the most potent instrument
490: available to American city planners for controlling urban development.
491: Zoning is basically the dividing of the city into discrete areas
492: within which only certain land uses and types of buildings can be
493: constructed. The rationale is that certain activities of building
494: types don't mix well; factories and homes, for example. Illogical
495: mixtures create nuisances for the parties involved and lower land
496: values. After several decades of gradual development, land-use zoning
497: received legal approval from the Supreme Court in 1926. <p>
498:
499: Zoning isn't the same as planning: it is a legal tool for the
500: implementation of plans. Zoning should be closely integrated with a
501: Master Plan or Comprehensive Plan that spells out a logical path for
502: the city's future in areas such as land use, transportation, parks and
503: recreation, environmental quality, and public works construction. In
504: the early days of zoning this was often neglected, but this lack of
505: coordination between zoning and planning is less common now. <p>
506:
507: The other important elements of existing city planning are subdivision
508: regulations and environmental regulations. Subdivision regulations
509: require that land being subdivided for development be provided with
510: adequate street, sewers, water, schools, utilities, and various design
511: features. The goal is to prevent shabby, deficient developments that
512: produce headaches for both their residents and the city. Since the
513: late 1960s, environmental regulations have exerted a stronger
514: influence on patterns of urban growth by restricting development in
515: floodplains, on unstable slopes, on earthquake faults, or near
516: sensitive natural areas. Businesses have been forced to reduce smoke
517: emissions and the disposal of wastes has been more closely monitored.
518: Overall, the pace of environmental degradation has been slowed, but
519: certainly not stopped, and a dismaying backlog of environmental
520: hazards remains to be cleaned up. City planners have plenty of work to
521: do as we move into the twenty-first century. <p>
522:
523: <h2>Conclusion: Good City Form</h2>
524:
525: What is the good city? We are unlikely to arrive at an unequivocal
526: answer; the diversity of human needs and tastes frustrates all
527: attempts to provide recipes or instruction manuals for the building of
528: cities. However, we can identify the crucial dimensions of city
529: performance, and specify the many ways in which cities can achieve
530: success along these dimensions. <p>
531:
532: A most useful guide in this enterprise is Kevin Lynch's A Theory of
533: Good City Form (Cambridge, MA, MIT Press, 1981). Lynch offers five
534: basic dimensions of city performance: vitality, sense, fit, access,
535: and control. To these he adds two "meta-criteria," efficiency and
536: justice. <p>
537:
538: For Lynch, a vital city successfully fulfils the biological needs of
539: its inhabitants, and provides a safe environment for their activities.
540: A sensible city is organized so that its residents can perceive and
541: understand the city's form and function. A city with good fit provides
542: the buildings, spaces, and networks required for its residents to
543: pursue their projects successfully. An accessible city allows people
544: of all ages and background to gain the activities, resources,
545: services, and information that they need. A city with good control is
546: arranged so that its citizens have a say in the management of the
547: spaces in which they work and reside. <p>
548:
549: Finally, an efficient city achieves the goals listed above at the
550: least cost, and balances the achievement of the goals with one
551: another. They cannot all be maximized at the same time. And a just
552: city distributes benefits among its citizens according to some fair
553: standard. Clearly, these two meta-criteria raise difficult issues
554: which will continue to spark debates for the foreseeable future. <p>
555:
556: These criteria tell aspiring city builders where to aim, while
557: acknowledging the diverse ways of achieving good city form. Cities are
558: endlessly fascinating because each is unique, the product of decades,
559: centuries, or even millennia of historical evolution. As we walk
560: through city streets, we walk through time, encountering the
561: city-building legacy of past generations. Paris, Venice, Rome, New
562: York, Chicago, San Francisco -- each has its glories and its failures.
563: In theory, we should be able to learn the lessons of history and build
564: cities that our descendants will admire and wish to preserve. That
565: remains a constant challenge for all those who undertake the task of
566: city planning. <p>
567:
568: <p>
569:
570: <hr>
571: <p>
572: <h2>Micropolis, Unix Version.</h2>
573: This game was released for the Unix platform
574: in or about 1990 and has been modified for inclusion in the One Laptop
575: Per Child program. Copyright © 1989 - 2007 Electronic Arts Inc. If
576: you need assistance with this program, you may contact:
577: <a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Micropolis">http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Micropolis</a> or email <a href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected]</a>.
578: </p><p>
579:
580: This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
581: it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
582: the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at
583: your option) any later version.
584: </p><p>
585:
586: This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
587: WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
588: MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU
589: General Public License for more details. You should have received a
590: copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If
591: not, see <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/">http://www.gnu.org/licenses/</a>.
592: </p><p>
593:
594: <h3 align="center">ADDITIONAL TERMS per GNU GPL Section 7</h3>
595:
596: </p><p>
597: No trademark or publicity rights are granted. This license does NOT
598: give you any right, title or interest in the trademark SimCity or any
599: other Electronic Arts trademark. You may not distribute any
600: modification of this program using the trademark SimCity or claim any
601: affliation or association with Electronic Arts Inc. or its employees.
602: </p><p>
603:
604: Any propagation or conveyance of this program must include this
605: copyright notice and these terms.
606: </p><p>
607:
608: If you convey this program (or any modifications of it) and assume
609: contractual liability for the program to recipients of it, you agree
610: to indemnify Electronic Arts for any liability that those contractual
611: assumptions impose on Electronic Arts.
612: </p><p>
613:
614: You may not misrepresent the origins of this program; modified
615: versions of the program must be marked as such and not identified as
616: the original program.
617: </p><p>
618:
619: This disclaimer supplements the one included in the General Public
620: License. <b>TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMISSIBLE UNDER APPLICABLE LAW, THIS
621: PROGRAM IS PROVIDED TO YOU "AS IS," WITH ALL FAULTS, WITHOUT WARRANTY
622: OF ANY KIND, AND YOUR USE IS AT YOUR SOLE RISK. THE ENTIRE RISK OF
623: SATISFACTORY QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE RESIDES WITH YOU. ELECTRONIC ARTS
624: DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY WARRANTIES,
625: INCLUDING IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, SATISFACTORY QUALITY,
626: FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NONINFRINGEMENT OF THIRD PARTY
627: RIGHTS, AND WARRANTIES (IF ANY) ARISING FROM A COURSE OF DEALING,
628: USAGE, OR TRADE PRACTICE. ELECTRONIC ARTS DOES NOT WARRANT AGAINST
629: INTERFERENCE WITH YOUR ENJOYMENT OF THE PROGRAM; THAT THE PROGRAM WILL
630: MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS; THAT OPERATION OF THE PROGRAM WILL BE
631: UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR-FREE, OR THAT THE PROGRAM WILL BE COMPATIBLE
632: WITH THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE OR THAT ANY ERRORS IN THE PROGRAM WILL BE
633: CORRECTED. NO ORAL OR WRITTEN ADVICE PROVIDED BY ELECTRONIC ARTS OR
634: ANY AUTHORIZED REPRESENTATIVE SHALL CREATE A WARRANTY. SOME
635: JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OF OR LIMITATIONS ON IMPLIED
636: WARRANTIES OR THE LIMITATIONS ON THE APPLICABLE STATUTORY RIGHTS OF A
637: CONSUMER, SO SOME OR ALL OF THE ABOVE EXCLUSIONS AND LIMITATIONS MAY
638: NOT APPLY TO YOU.</b>
639: </p>
640: </body>
This archive runs on limited infrastructure. Preserving old code on modern bandwidth. Automated agents are requested to crawl responsibly.