Urban design

From Cyburbian graciela: This is a bit trivial but have any of you ever reflected on the the effect that the style of on-street parking can have on the percieved quality of an urban sidewalk/streetscape? In an urban setting, my opinion has always been on-street parking=good. I never really cared if it was parallel or angled. I always let the site/context/traffic patterns, etc. dictate the form of the onstreet parking.

Is one more institutional than the other? Maybe angled is more informal? What are your thoughts?

(Cyburbia Forums original post)

From Cyburbian Jess: They claimed they have the world’s tallest tower. Now, they have the future greenest city in the world.

"Launched as a “Sustainability Action Plan” to deliver the world’s greenest city. On 21 January 2008, a model of the Masdar City at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi. Groundbreaking for the construction of the city is slated in the first quarter of this year, and hopefully will be completed and fully functional in 2015."

From Cyburbian munibulldog: Does anyone have an example of a zoning ordinance section that permits Grasspave2 or other pervious parking lot paving for required parking?

Our ordinance currently requires "asphaltic or concretic" paving on required parking spaces. There is a desire to allow grasspaver or similar pervious systems. Any good or bad experiences with pervious paving?

(Cyburbia Forums original post)

From Cyburbian KSharpe: From The Onion: 3'-By-4' Plot Of Green Space Rejuvenates Neighborhood

This is obviously an exaggeration, but have you ever demanded green space from a developer or in a plan that you knew would never be used by anyone?

(Cyburbia Forums original post)

From Cyburbian Maister: Most people would agree that art in public spaces has the potential to beautify or otherwise enhance an environment. Public art at its grandest scale can serve as an iconic landmark, as in the case of the Eiffel Tower

or the Christ the Redeemer statue

Why then is there a popular perception that public art seldom delivers what it promises? Why does it so often seem that if there’s, say, $50,000 dollars of public money to spend on a sculpture, it ends up in the form of, well….nothing. That is, no recognizable forms part of our normal sensory experiences.

From Cyburbian monkeyflower: A neighborhood in my town has asked the city to consider closing off a couple of streets (creating cul-de-sacs) in order to address two concerns:

First is cut-through traffic - cars detouring through the neighborhood, speeding and ignoring stop signs, in order to avoid the lights on parallel major roads.

Second is crime concerns - if the streets are cut-off, the theory goes, drug and prostitution activity will be reduced because the dealers and johns won't have getaway routes, so they'll go elsewhere.

I've been asked to comment on this idea. My immediate reaction was that it's a bad idea - the best case scenario, after all, is just pushing the crime and traffic to the next block over. (Which some of the neighborhood residents think is just fine, "because that's a major street", but I'm not so convinced it's an improvement at the community level.

From Cyburbian b3nr: All your talk of your crazy American cities with their 'grids', 'subdivisions' and 'zoning' plans and whatnot inspired me to explain the anatomy of what an British city actually looks like and what effects their growth and form. With the aid of a handy new function on livemaps. (You can extend this to most Irish cities too).

Part one is the photogenic historical city core. Part two will be the less photogenic inner city suburbs and part three, the sprawling seemingly endless outer suburbs, employment areas and 'big box' retail and office space. The other two parts will be posted later this week or next week.

From Cyburbian rwshearer: Can someone please tell me why it is that many ARB's and Planning Commissions in suburbia insist that commercial buildings have a pitched roof? In many cases they specifically state that the building should have a residential appearance. As an architect, this drives me nuts. Why would you want a commercial building to look like a house? Even worse, most of these are the same people that use the words "historic downtown" when talking about what they want to see in their community. 90% of the buildings in an "historic downtown" have flat roofs! In fact, the pitched roof on commercial buildings seems to me to be a much more recent phenomenon.

From Cyburbian Supernova: First of all, I will say that I do not have training in urban planning, and I'm just beginning to do some research because it's fascinating to me.

I've had some ideas, I'd like to get some "expert" opinions: I envision town centers being "rounder", with roads spiraling out or in concentric circles. I realize this is not as "efficient", meaning you may not get from Point A to Point B in the fastest amount of time, but it would definitely add a more human and more social aspect to walking around town. The grid system of laying out roads and properties is, well, very square. I'm sure we can improve on it. It may be efficient, but it's not very livable.

From Cyburbian southern_yank: Creating a TOD plan is easy, but making the plan happen is a whole different story. My city is working on several transit-oriented plans, but it's still early in the process. Have any of you been successful in creating meaningful criterea by which to measure TOD success? A few variables which I think would work:

- Auto ownership rates
- Transit patronage
- Walk/bike trips
- Appropriate zoning regs adopted
- Business/resident surveys to determine if nearby transit influenced their decision to invest in neighborhood
- Traditional neighorhood indicators like housing prices, retail activity, etc within the TOD area and measured against pre-TOD data.

From Cyburbian JNA: HEADLINE: Astronomy village draws star gazers looking for darkness

HIGHLIGHTS:
The rules at this remote vacation spot are simple: no white light.

Deerlick Astronomy Village .... The 96-acre village in rural Taliaferro County is designed for amateur stargazers looking for total darkness and wide-open spaces to build weekend homes.

... figured the development would be popular. There are only two other similar communities nationwide - one in Florida and one in Arizona - and he said the demand for dark skies is soaring as suburban sprawl produces more light pollution.

From Cyburbian Vlaide: Has anyone ever used one, or been involved with a project with one? I'm thinking there could be some great application in parks and other specific places; not sure about the longevity of them and other issues. Curious to know. Maybe they haven't been around long enough to know. Seems like a great idea though.

(Cyburbia Forums original post)

From Cyburbian leehillpc: The county where I live is looking into implementing new design standards for commercial and industrial zoned land. One of the ideas that we've been discussing is locating gas pumps behind proposed convenience stores in the more historical sensitive areas of the county. Does anyone have examples of such a design? We've been receiving some flak for suggesting this but in this day and age I find it hard to believe that folks wouldn't know that 7-11, WaWa, Sheets, etc. sell gas if the pumps aren't in front.

(Cyburbia Forums original post)

From Cyburbian mendelman: The following is a series of photos of the Lake Club building on Lake St. in downtown Oak Park. It was the redevelopment of two old under-developed properties in a prime commerical district. It is approximately 10 stories, with ground floor retail, second floor health club and eight stories of residential units.

From Cyburbian Luca: Some holiday snaps? More like some thoughts on urban form in a different country.

Puerto de la Cruz (Formerly Puerto de la Orotava), is an old shipping/fishing harbor that became a tourist destination, largely post-war. By way of introduction here are some typical building styles. (Photos follow in the thread)