What explains neighborhood type statistically? – Mixing typo-morphological and spatial analytic approaches in urban morphology

Abstract

Society creates architectural styles and neighborhood types to communicate and promote values. Geographers and architects accordingly classify neighborhoods by historical periods, urban design, planning paradigms and plan elements, density, building types and architectural detail. This paper juxtaposes typo-morphological (historical emergence of urban forms through urban elements and pattern typologies) and spatial analytic (city defined by urban form factors and formulas) approaches in urban morphology to assess what explains neighborhood type statistically. The analyses of variance show that many urban form factors (residential and employment density, mix of residences and jobs, Floor Space Indexes (FSI), location, income, etc.) are statistically significant in neighborhood type (as a nominal composite variable). This means that neighborhood typologies be applied in spatial analyses and urban modelling as classes (context variables). The approach can be used in typo-morphological tradition to offer quantitative description to the persistent ‘problem of type’ and enrich the classification methodology.

Research on the Influence of Nonmorphological Elements’ Cognition on Architectural Design Education in Universities: Third Year Architecture Core Studio in Special Topics “Urban Village Renovation Design”

“…With the development of urbanization and the in-depth study of urban morphology [12], the essence of architectural design has evolved from the classical aesthetics, which focus on the harmonious relationship between single geometric form and proportion, to the "Morphological Gene Research," which integrates different levels of morphological elements such as urban space, texture, and structure [13]. In addition to the influence of the surrounding space, traffic, structure, modeling, and morphological elements on architectural design [14], other factors such as the road network, street texture, boundary, and skyline, can also be translated into symbolic and graphic language to guide architectural design [15]. In the early stage of architectural design, architects usually direct their attention towards geometrically related elements that facilitate formal operation.…”