Urban design

Urban design concerns the arrangement, appearance and functionality of towns and cities.

Its focus is particularly on public space (a.k.a. the ‘public environment’, ‘public realm’ or ‘public domain’) including the totality of spaces that are used freely on a day-to-day basis by the general public. This encompasses streets and parks together with public infrastructure and privately-owned places. It is concerned with the way these places are experienced and used, and so facades of buildings and other elements that contribute to the quality of public space are considered although the emphasis is on spaces between buildings rather than on the buildings themselves. Important writers on – and advocates for – the use of public space in this sense include Jane Jacobs, William H. Whyte and Jan Gehl.

Urban design considers:

Structure – How a place is put together and how its parts relate to each other

Accessibility – Providing for ease, safety and choice when moving to and through places

Legibility – Helping people to find their way around and understand how a place works

Animation – Designing places to stimulate public activity

Function and fit – Shaping places to support their varied intended uses

Complementary mixed uses – Locating activities to allow constructive interaction between them

Character and meaning – Recognizing and valuing the differences between one place and another

Order and incident – Balancing consistency and variety in the urban environment in the interests of appreciating both

Continuity and change – Locating people in time and place, including respect for heritage and support for contemporary culture

Civil society – Making places where people are free to encounter each other as civic equals

Public spaces are frequently subject to overlapping management responsibilities of multiple public agencies or authorities and the interests of nearby property owners, as well as the requirements of multiple and sometimes competing users. The design, construction and management of public spaces therefore typically demands consultation and negotiation at a variety of levels, and urban designers rarely have the degree of artistic liberty or control sometimes offered in design professions such as architecture. It also typically requires interdisciplinary input with balanced representation of multiple fields including engineering, ecology, local history, and transport planning.

The scale and degree of detail considered varies depending on context and needs. It ranges from the layout of entire cities, as with l’Enfant’s plan for Washington DC and Griffin and Mahony’s plan for Canberra (although such opportunities are obviously rare), through ‘managing the sense of a region’ as described by Kevin Lynch, to the design of street furniture.

Urban design may encompass the preparation of design guidelines or even legislation to control development, advertising, etc. and in this sense overlaps with urban planning. It may encompass the design of particular spaces and structures and in this sense overlaps with architecture, landscape architecture and industrial design. It may also deal with ‘place management’ to guide and assist the use and maintenance of urban areas.

Much urban design work is undertaken by urban planners, landscape architects and architects but there are professionals who identify themselves specifically as urban designers and some university programs that offer degrees in urban design.

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