Discuss Real Life Architecture, Structure And Sociology

Hmmh, I am a bit sceptical when you say that you could have clusters
of grids separated by large parklands. This in an exreme case holds also for New York,
which in my opinion does not have the most attractive grid layout (Central Park
is the only area where Manhattan Kids get to know what curves are ).

And well, you could make anything artificial, so also having artificial
hills, lakes, to break a layout... So what I personally would
prefer was a rule of thumb for one block unit within a grid layout.
Adelaide also uses parks at the center of each block unit.
So apparently, this was simple way to make the grud more attractive,
are there any other examples.
Another way I know was to make block units with garden space in the backyards,
so that each housing unit has its own "park", though much smaller,
but also much more personalized. That is e.g. given in some
outer central parts of the city of Bremen, Germany...

 

I am almost at the point where I would say go to your PC,
start CXL, and develop some nice grid layout in your city

 

For sure we will want to define a grid-based city, and you brought up some
interesting example of Vienna I'd personally not have considered to be grid-like at first sight,
but with the deeper look at it, there is nothing else for me to do then to agree to
your analysis.

I was a bit confused when you said that we're talking apples and turnips;
first, because for me as a non-native speaker, I only have a slight clue of what you
wanted to say; second, as I interpreted this "apples and turnips" saying as
Ladies and Gentlemen that don't talk in a straightforward way about a certain topic,
but are rambling and digressing, I was confused when you started with a
quite good suggestion, brought up a good example of Vienna, but then did not
see anything regarding a possible relationship between e.g. road layouts
and inner-city traffic congestions (and really, I do not have the slightest intention
to offend you ).

Am I right that you wanted to state that grid-like cities with rather a lot
of intra-connected roads are superior over cities that have a lot of dead-endings
and cul-de-sacs?

I would directly agree to this statement, but I'm not sure about the overall superiority
of grid layouts.

If we take a rather widespread grid-layouted city, without even diagonally running streets breaking
the grid, as it was given for some American cities, even for New York when you move upwards
to Midtown Manhattan, one could say that a grid city will be a rip-off for its inhabitants.
So Manhattan was a good example for what could happen when you overkill the grid:
no one really uses a car there anymore as a resident, you mostly have taxis driving through it
(see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan#Infrastructure).
Furthermore, the city government had to invest heavily into extensive underground
networks, to come up with the people's need for fast and frugal travelling.
For the few cars, complex solutions were built, see the many tunnels and the even more complex
transition systems. So at least, partially, I do disagre with people saying that the grid was the most
efficient road layout. Go for some medieval rooted European city like Cologne is,
and you will notice that many roads at first sight may not follow a strict geometrical order,
but when you take a deeper look, you will find them to run almost directly from A to B,
which is, if I'm correct, still the shortest connection between two points
Of course, you nowadays do not find the roads quite useful, as the former point may have been
a meanwhile urbanized rural landscape in front of the oldest parts of the city,
but sometimes, and not that rarely, you will still benefit from that scenic street layout,
especially using a car.

So we should still be clear about how we imagine grid layouts to be like:
are they truly extensive, do they have large connector roads as feature of the plan,
are they planned with thought regarding future living (well, we all know that the answer
here will most likely be "no"), this just for traffic problems, not mentioning
some mental aspects (e.g. like "can I identify with a plain grid, or do I want to
live in a city that was created rather than it was just planned?").
So, yes, maybe we do find some more real-life examples for successful grids
in all manners

 

Yes, superblocks, "don't mention the devil", says the pedestrian
Superblocks in general may be the most car-friendly solution,
but the lesser number of possible entries to the inner inhabited area
makes you depend on free surrounding expressways,
which will not always be achieved in larger cities or even in the wider
metropolitan areas...

 

Here some idea of how to overcome
all the problems with the common grid,
yet just a sketch and not totally outworked, though...

 

Yes, you're right, having 5 or 6 way intersections was kind of bad for car drivers...
Maybe we can have each of thr 2 vertical running streets to be one-way roads,
so the people driving right to left would need to drive longer
(or vice versa in Downunder), and you could mirror it maybe for another set of
streets running that way. But all in all, it would become a rather 4 way intersection,
as usual...

 

Okay, so I think we should go on a bit and not rest with just one topic
and try to find more knowledge where there is none...

To sum it up, you maybe agree with me that grids in the past have been
a cheap solution for city planners, but within the following centuries,
as traffic forms had changed, the grid itself had become superfluous;
it neither is that car-friendly (better: superblocks for example), and given
an extensive grid without street hierarchy, it will be a horror for the ones who live there...
Furthermore, it does not take into account topographical highlights, which will
lead to situations where you have steep streets that will be dangerous for pedestrians
as well as for car drivers in the winter, given the city lies in a zone of moderate climate.

Also, as the example of Manhattan shows, there can be an overkill of a grid
layout such that it will reverse the car vs. public transportation relationship...

On top of that, grid layouts often look boring, and I tend to say that their
inhabitants at some point in their life won't identify with this boredom anymore...

To overcome that boredom, mostly parks will help that are placed within the grid blocks,
seen in Adelaide and Savannah. Furthermore, planners should take into account topographical
highlights rather than put concrete on them...

So, if you want to add something, you can of course go ahead, we live in a free community here

Just for the next topic, what would be your wishes?
I have noticed the urge to also share your experiences regarding the places you have been living in
(is that correct, or do I have to use "were living in" instead; I'd say that "were living in" allows
only for things that happened in the concluded past, so that it would mean you do not actually
live somewhere in the present, whereas "have been living in" allows for both, without
emphasizing past experiences as much as I'd have wished for, though...).
Anyways, as already mentioned in some posts before, we could maybe put your urge
to share experiences under the headline of "Living in Widespread Towns vs. Living in
Narrow Cities", and later discuss the advantages and disadvantages, or even discuss
them within your statements about the experiences, as some of you will have changed
locations from large narrow cities to widespread towns and vice versa, too...

Comments?

 

Maybe we should have a poll?
If that was possible...

 

Just flew over that "Fused Grid" article... Starting with
"Aristotle, a pre-eminent philosopher...", I knew I was on the right
way to end up in oblivion...
Seems like we found a winner with that form
of the "Fused Grid", though the creativity is rather shown
in a locally public area than in the direct public area...
But I still like it!

So, as I said in the first post, I intended this thread
to cover a lot of parts; and yes, like any radio moderator,
I need to do tough choices to keep the audience attracted.
Thing is that if I only talk about grids, one will lose it after a while;
not because there was nothing more to talk about, but rather
because it was too hard to explain your thoughts straightforwardly,
we would need to write research papers about that field
sooner or later, the more we got into that theme...
Of course we all like to do so, but I don't think we have the time
to do so (maybe some architects and urban planners here have already
written such articles, but I would still say it took them lots of time
just to add the smallest things).
Maybe I can ask IcyHot to open another sub-forum regarding our interests
to exchange thoughts about real life problems regarding urbanism.
Then I could leave this specific thread here open for grids
and we could switch topics like we wanted to

 

Just asked The Funky Monk (and maybe later will ask IcyHot, as he is the admin)
whether it was possible ton have a new sub-forum in the part "XL Nation",
where we could easily post and find such threads like this one here and then switch
as we wish to. I mean, it can be possible that someone new comes up in 2 days and
has good suggestions about grids, but then we had moved along.
So I agree with you and will wait for a response...