Block analysis of West End

I have chosen West End as my analysis topic. I have selected this as the area appeals to me in terms of use, vistas and connectivity (See Figure1). There are (+-)86 blocks located in West End with another 33 blocks located over the river bringing the total to 119. The block size runs from around 425sqm (Small lot) to larger parcels of land at around 4.25ha. The amount of intersections is a surprising 184 with only 54 across the river totalling 238. There is a main road that runs parallel to the river, and one that goes East geographically centred in the middle.




















Figure 1




















Figure 2

In Figure 2, the overall appearance of the street layout appears to either be running along the River or it forms a setback. Also, the lot sizes are larger along the river and the streets fall back roughly from the river instead of being relative to a more traditional North-South/East-West relationship.



















Figure 3

There is a predominantly smaller block size in Figure 3 compared to the areas in Figure 2. These follow the cardinal directions with main streets/roads following these as well but a main road that leads from the Northern part to the South Western corner runs parallel to the river. The Yellow section has roads that run in opposite to the other streets. This area is dominated by the river that curves to the right of the site. Florence Italy. When I overlay the map of West End I was surprised by the similarities in the street block sizes and the use of blocks further away from the river. The distances between major roads is also similar.


















Madrid Spain.

The regular pattern blocks are common to West End. Long wide roads that cross to open areas. Brisbane 1884 Historical.Showing this map of 1884 shows why the layout of West End has arrived to it's current destination. You can see that some land use has been allocated to being to a storage area, and the density increases along the other side of roads.In 1895, you can see a further development of the previously regulated area, with downsizing of lots which would indicate an increase of population density.















Brisbane 1895.

Conclusion.
There are many reasons to know about the layouts of cities and their footprints. It gives a feel for the urban fabric in terms variety of what might work if you have some of the pieces of the puzzle scattered all over the world, and, it's a matter of transferring these to create a matrix of styles and design layouts.One thing that I can't digest is the fact that this type of analysis only is a slice from the ground foot prints down. It doesn't show use, character, diversity or any other indicators. But, in understanding variety of civil street layout and what we can perceive as being a form of structure and it's historical uses.

References:
Jacob, A. 1993. Great streets. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Google Map of West End Area: http://maps.google.com.au/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=west+end&sll=-27.936181,153.017578&sspn=13.836006,28.54248&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=West+End+Queensland&ll=-27.480482,153.017793&spn=0.027184,0.072098&t=p&z=15 (Date accessed 16/04/10)

McKellar, A. R. McKellar's official map of Brisbane & suburbs [cartographic material] 1895. MAP RM 3036. http://www.nla.gov.au/apps/cdview?pi=nla.map-rm3036-c2-e (Date Accessed 18/04/10)

[Moreton 20 chains to an inch : sheet 1B [cartographic material]by Queensland. Surveyor General's Office Brisbane : Surveyor Generals Office, 1884. http://www.nla.gov.au/apps/cdview?pi=nla.map-rm3046-e (Date Accessed 18/04/10)

Interpretation of City Forms

Mini-City called Madess. As far as a vision of the city, it was one that "Had a liveable and sustainable centre, with a defused centre that had focus points that occurred outside of the city centre. It separated Industrial from the commercial/residential uses, for terms of cleaner living". I guess Madess would be fairly unsustainable city, because of it's layout. Describing it's outer extremities, a Southern commercial zone supported by residential area with no public transport; this area seems to be a satellite suburb. Vegetated areas to the East create a natural landscape. Moving towards the CBD, there are two tightly packed high density Industrial areas separated by a river but are linked by bridge. Another bridge crossing the river further East linking the medium density Northern city area to the dense South creates two nodes. With green zones between Industrial areas and residential, it creates balance between lifestyle and liveability but also adds to travelling times and a need for a transport corridor. In some respects it appears to mirror Brisbane's current urban layout, but Madess seems to have a higher density and concentration.

Future development would occur to the East, as development opportunities and population increases. A new industrial area would be need to be developed to sustain liability and affordability. problems arise with higher traffic densities. Public spaces as well as access to natural green areas would make living there more attractive. Things that seemed to be lacking are things like an education based centre/city, like Armidale NSW , or Munster in Germany , each have a weak industrial zone but have a strong educational one.

In terms of wholeness, this exercise I feel didn't go as deeply as would be explained in "A New theory of urban design" / Christopher Alexander ... [et al.]. In this book it is noted that they went into development of a urban theory that changes the outlook of how developing cities and urban areas are created as a "wholeness". In our mini city exercise, we explore the physical relationships through distance and volume as our building blocks where simplistic and crude, as well as the paper cut representations of our civic infrastructure. So scale was also an important issue to address. Seeing relationships between uses and their respective owners is something that had needed to be developed. Without consultation between interested parties we fail to address the users for the current time, but also for the future potential needs.

Why Town Planning?

My experiences with Town Planning from my enjoyment of the uses between developments / policy and their implementation over time. I wish to further study in the fields of urban spaces and Urban Semiotics. Being at QUT, I feel offers a great location to the city in which to experience such interactions. During this course, I wish to gain a better understanding of practises and theories are applied to Urban spaces. I believe that this unit is a core subject in terms of the visual and informative application of the planning theory, and, I feel that working through this unit I will achieve a more expressive outcome in how I interperate my surroundings.