Professional Documents
Culture Documents
ROB KRIER
Square Street
Typical functions of urban spaces
The street is a product of the spread of a settlement once houses have been built
on all available space around its central square.
It has a more pronouncedly functional character than the square, which by virtue
of its size.
They were planned to the scale of the human being, the horse and the carriage.
The street is unsuitable for the flow of motorized traffic, whilst remaining
appropriate to human circulation and activity.
It provides a framework for the distribution of land and gives access to individual plots.
Residential Street Commercial Street
Street Character
In all probability the square was the first way man discovered of using urban
space.
It is produced by the grouping of houses around an open space.
This arrangement afforded a high degree of control of the inner space, as
well as facilitating a ready defense against external aggression by minimizing
the external surface area liable to attack.
This kind of courtyard frequently came to bear a symbolic value and was
therefore chosen as the model for the construction of numerous holy places
(agora, forum, cloister, mosque courtyard).
With the invention of houses built around a central courtyard or atrium this
spatial pattern became a model for the future. Here rooms were arranged
around a central courtyard like single housing units around a square.
The Square
Cultural Activities
Commercial Activities
Marketplace
Parade ground
ceremonial squares
Churches and town halls
Public & administrative Buildings
Community Halls and Youth Centers
Libraries, Theatres, Concert Halls, Cafes
Functions that generate activity 24 Hours a day
Greek Agora Roman Forum
Plaza del Popolo, Rome
Grande place, Brussels
La Place Stanislas, Nancy
La-place-des-vosges-Paris
Madrid. Plaza Mayor
How BUILDING SECTION affect urban space
• 1. Standard traditional section with pitched roof,
• 2. With flat roof.
• 3. With top floor set back. This devise reduces the
height of the building visible to the eye.
• 4. With a projection on pedestrian level in the form
of an arcade or a solid structure. This device
distances the pedestrian from the real body of the
building and creates a pleasing human scale. John
Nash in his Park Crescent, London, applied this type
of section with particular virtuosity.
• 5. Half way up the building, the section is reduced by
half its depth; this allows for extensive floors on the
lower level and flats with access balconies on the
upper level.
• 6. Random terracing.
• 7. Slopping elevation with vertical lower and upper
floors.
• 8. Sloping elevation with protruding ground floor,
• 9. Stepped section.
• 10. Sloping section with moat or freestanding
ground floor.
• 11. Standard section with moat.
• 12. Building with ground floor arcades.
How BUILDING SECTION affect urban space
Angling
Segmentation
Addition
Merging
Overlapping
Distortion
Spatial Types and how they might be combined