The Urban Public Space for the People (Part 2)

2 People-oriented daily construction

Different from the large-scale collective activities in the 1970s and 1980s, the needs of daily activities in urban public spaces nowadays have become more diverse and compatible, including socialization, consumption, culture, leisure, recreation, experience, fitness, healing, and other activities (Figure 4). So how to lay the foundation for the construction of public space in the urban designing work?

Figure 4: Diverse Public Life Needs

A good city meets the needs of people in terms of behavioural activities, physical sensations, and psychological cognition, and also forms a number of core values of urban design, including identifiability, accessibility, permeability, diversity, richness, personalization, and visual appropriateness, etc., which are all related to the quality of public space. In order for these core values to better guide urban design work and shape the "people-oriented” public spaces, leading to the proposal of four considerations of aspects, including "path, space, use, and field".

2.1 "Path" - path layout with consideration of people's movement 

The so-called "paths" are the roads which citizens enter and exit public spaces on a daily basis. Accessibility can be seen as the primary and significant characteristics for public spaces to consider, which mainly includes two aspects: compactness and equity. Compactness corresponds to the urban layout within walking distance, providing public spaces and path systems connecting with functional areas within proper walking distance. Equity means reasonable allocation, the allocation of public resources should match the needs of people in the neighbouring communities and functional areas, and take into account the differences in the traveling ability of vulnerable people including disabilities, the elderly, and children, so as to respond to the needs of more people's public activities through the synergism of path systems and spatial nodes.

In the urban design case of the park area of Sichuan North Road in Hongkou, Shanghai, the urban rail line, main roads, and municipal rain water pipelines create multiple cuts in the area, making the public space inaccessible. The urban design study proposed a three-dimensional traffic network by opening up several nodes through overpassed or under-passed ways, linking the city's original pedestrian network, so that more citizens can avoid the obstacles and enjoy the well-being of the green parks, before and after the comparison of the path can be seen in the difference between the repair and improvement of the impact on the use of public space in the city (Figure 5).

Figure 5: Drawings of the urban design study of areas surrounding Sichuan North Road park, Hongkou, Shanghai

2.2 "Space" - attractive space for people to stay 

“Space” refers to the high-quality public space based on human beings’ needs, and the principles of building enclosure, comfortable human scale, rich form, and appropriate equipment for people to exercise and rest are the key rules for shaping high-quality public space. A good public space can attract people to stay and prompt different activities such as socializing, healing, and resting, which includes enjoying the cityscape and people-watching.

Good building enclosure is the beginning to construct a high-quality public space. Vientiane City in Shenzhen, TaiKoo Li Sanlitun in Beijing, and Daning International Business Plaza in Shanghai (Figure 6) are commercial districts occupying complete several blocks, where the quasi-public space is enclosed by surrounding buildings, and the scale of the enclosed space is not very large, but the square is still highly enveloped, and the relationship between the building heights and the scale of the plazas is very comfortable for people.

Figure 6: Vientiane City in Shenzhen on the left, TaiKoo Li Sanlitun in Beijing in the middle, and Daning International Business Plaza in Shanghai on the right

In the urban design of the 22 and 23-1 blocks in Shenzhen's Futian District, the two green parks alongside the road occupying independent blocks are enveloped by other surrounding constructions, and possess a high-quality sense of spatial belonging. Unlike the aforementioned shaping of (quasi) public space within a single block, this kind of mutual limitation of buildings and public space between different neighbourhoods is difficult to be controlled by the development agency or designer of a particular site during the construction process, and requires the use of urban design and its guideline control to be realized in the process of multi-project implementation (Figure. 7).

Figure 7: 22 and 23-1 blocks in Futian District, Shenzhen

Taking "humans’ feelings" as the benchmark, it is necessary to respond to people's perceptual experience and behavioural characteristics happened in the space, such as people's sight line, sight distance, as well as architectural scale, spatial scale, and interface support for activities. People's experience of activities in the space is also affected by auditory perception, such as stable background sound (e.g., soft sound of falling water) provides a more relaxing reading environment, social and dining activities require background sound to enhance privacy, while strong background sound (e.g., fast-paced music) is conducive to movement and rapid consumption.

The creation of these public spaces for people's daily lives requires urban design to build a basic framework, and also allows architects and landscape designers more room for quality enhancement on this basis.

The Gongchenqiao Area of Hangzhou is the historical Hangzhou water gateway area of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, and has rich historical and cultural resources. The D32 Commercial Complex Block Project on Qiaoxizhi Street in this area has been planned and designed by urban designers, starting from the overall shape of the surrounding area, breaking up the huge architecture massing into small premises. Thus, avoiding uncomfortable feelings while people walking in the historical environment, and enclosing a number of public spaces, which are connected to the existing streets along the river, to form a symbiosis of the old and the new public space system, and to satisfy the diversified needs of the citizens and tourists. In addition to ensuring the dependence of the buildings and public spaces, it also pays attention to the relationship between the activities in the public spaces and the supporting functions of the interfaces, and the public space scale in order to satisfy people's suitable and rich visual experience (Figure. 8).

Figure 8. The D32 Commercial Complex Block Project in Hangzhou

Author: Zhuang Yu, Professor, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University; Vice Chairman, Urban Design Branch, Urban Planning Society of China

Source: <https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/OZPM796fBy4c-7Pfim5SYg>

Translated by Zhang Chenxi