Professional Documents
Culture Documents
- Jonathan Barnett
Book Review
Madhavi Patil,
PICA,M.Arch, Urban Design SEM III
Urban Design as a public Policy
-Jonathan Barnett A zoning lot merger is the joining of two or
more adjacent zoning lots into one new
The author in this book explains about practical methods of improving cities. zoning lot. Unused development rights may
be shifted from one lot to another, as-of-
right, only through a zoning lot merger.
Why to improve cities?
The boundaries between urban &rural & city & suburbs blur. This is because of the process
of growth which has its own side effects.
These side effects have created awareness amongst people about ecology & relatedness of
actions.
Todays cities are not an accident. Its form is usually unintentional, but it is not accidental.
It is a product of decisions made for single separate purpose, whose interrelationships and
side effects have not been fully considered.
Also cities are not designed by making pictures of the way should look 20 years from now.
They are created by decision making process that goes on continuously day after day.
In this chapter, the author explains the concept of safeguarding of public interests in privately
financed real estate development.
Most of our cities & suburbs have been constructed by private investors. The government
also builds or participates in financing of an increasing number of structures. Real estate
developers sole objectives are making money. Some people who are concerned about
future of environment feel that it is wrong that guiding principle of development is the profit
motive & the private enterprise has generally not successful in making satisfactory cities.
He talks about the planning commission of New York, e.g. Times & Square Plaza.-
It was a private development & the developer was trying to take advantage of the plaza
bonus.
Plaza Bonus is a policy where in if you provide a public plaza, you get an incentive of 20%.
The developer didnt want give this valuable rental frontage & planned a low building.
So the planning commissioner noticed such issue & made guidelines for such situations.
e.g. Theatre District The Theatres in the boundary had become part of a series of
interconnected land uses. They realised the importance of theatres in the broadways
without its theatres it would loose much of its sparkle.
So they had to find a way for developer to build new theatres as a part of their office build
dings.
Policy - developers could apply to the planning commission for increase in size of building by
20% in return for building a legitimate theatre.
Gist Preservation of valuable features of the city & the creation of desirable amenities can
be achieved if you find a way to make them profitable.
This chapter talks about the special zoning districts and how these methods can be to city
design without designing buildings.
This proves that zoning could be valuable card in the hands of those seeking to improve the
design & planning of town of cities.
1. Planned Unit Development PUD or cluster Zoning used in rural & suburban areas,
intensively developed for 1st time.
Ordinary Zoning Regulations would be suspended for a particular plot & developer if
he submits a master plan for high density clusters of housing with significant % of
open space / in natural state.
2. Urban Renewal This technique offers a high degree of design control since the
government can set whatever condition for sell it likes.
The criticisms of urban renewal have been over the destructive of wholesale
demolition of existing structures of line of citizens & economic health of city.
3. Zoning incentive - Its most significant design feature was a provision that developer
could achieve 20% extra FAR if provided with Plaza / Public / Semi-public spaces.
The story of proposed building using air rights over grand central station illustrates how
zoning laws and unfriendly architectural philosophies makes it hard to preserve landmarks.
The New Yorks grand central terminal was built in classical style as monument to
commodore Vanderbilt & is one of the 1st bldg. to be declared as landmark.
The Penn central railroad decided to develop Air rights over the existing building. FAR was
15, 18 with the plaza. No plaza was possible but an official bldg. with an area of 13.5 times 4
acres site was permitted by zoning. Architect proposed 700 high office building with
Saving a landmark is always going to be difficult process that requires strong leadership by
govt. & strong political support by concerned citizens.
This Chapter describes ways in which urban design with the assistance of members of
public can be used to preserve urban neighbourhoods and solve some of the problems
connected to the city.
Paul Davidoff suggested that city should be modelled on the legal system.
Every interest in the community should have its own planners & plans & truth would emerge
as an adversary process. Advocacy planning.
So they thought of creating a working committee which consist of planning & designing
professionals who are outsiders but with the help of local resident would analyse the area
and propose design accordingly.
And the other one is Community committee consist of local residents who are exposed to
realistic limitations of the design by professionals & thus help in promoting the designer
without objecting.
Such a change in administrative structure can makes a substantial difference to the quality of
urban life.
Highways & rapid transits system are identified as primary determinants of city design today
and ways of controlling these elements are described.
Highways are tremendous economic impact upon the areas in which they are built. The
effect in urban areas is often negative disrupting neighbourhoods etc.
But in less dense areas they act as an economic stimulus, land value increases, new districts
are open for Real estate.
The Federal Highway Act 1970 said the planning of highway along with the development is
a legal requirement.
The result has been the increasing use of joint development schemes.
So the highway construction are engineering problems has now become complete multi-
The author says the most important thing to remember about design review is that due
process must always be observed and the review procedure should follow clearly explicable
principles & standards.Basic intention is to avoid clashes between different authority
decisions.
A format should be developed for design review studies, which specify the points of
intersects to the city, without trying to detect the architectural details of the buildings.
In this chapter author differentiate between urban planner & urban designer.
A city planner is concerned with allocation of resources according to the projection of future
need. Architects on other hand designs buildings.
So there is substantial middle ground which someone has to fill. Someone is needed to
design the city not buildings.
Thus civil service establishment accepted this argument that there was a need for someone
who could be called for urban designer.
The future of urban designer lies with those governmental authorities that have the power
to make large scale decision about the environmental and those whose activities have a big
impact on our physical surroundings. Author also says better urban design will be achieved
by a partnership between private investment & government and between decision maker
and professional.