Urban Design and Placemaking Issues - Essay Example

Urban design and placemaking Urban design and placemaking Introduction Placemaking involves creating spaces that enhance the safety, comfort and happiness of individuals (Ganjavie 2014). It capitalizes on the potential of a community’s local assets, potential and inspiration. In placemaking, considerations of the social-cultural activities that take place in the designed space are important. Urban designs, on the other hand, involve a collaborative and a multidisciplinary process undertaken to shape the physical setting of various cities, villages and towns. It involves design of buildings and various landscapes and the establishment of the required framework for the development of such buildings and frameworks. Social design involves the designer coming up with creative designs while keeping his or her responsibility in the society in mind. The designer uses the design to bring about the required social change. From the definitions, it is evident that there exist a relationship between urban design, social design and placemaking. In all of them, the designer has the client’s preferences at heart designing to ensure that the wants of their clients are fulfilled. In place making, the comfort and happiness of the client is the motivation behind its design. In urban design, the main motivation involves changing the shape of villages, cities and towns according to the specification of clients in those areas. In social design, the designer is interested in enhancing their social responsibility. Despite this relationship, social design is not the first to consider when doing urban design and placemaking. The reason is that it is difficult for inhabitants in a certain area to have the same sense of place (Lucas 2012). Individual clients for the different designs experience multiple and disjointed areas with poor relationships among them. There exists a difference between social policy, expectations of the reform is and real-place making capacity. There is an increasing tension existing between planners and architects concerned with placemaking and an enlightened approach to urban designs, though they all have a less socially based agenda. Despite that, they still have a tremendous influence on shaping what can be built through the enforcement of the technical requirements and standards. Urban designs does not start with social design, it could start with needs and preferences of the client, which is more important than social design. In beginning the social impact initiative for these social designers, they have to declare their specific intentions. The reason is that designs and innovations are crucial in many of the available complex problems in the society. Social designs Social designs involve designing with a social impact in consideration. The social designer comes up with designs to enhance their social responsibility (Grabski 2008). It is concerned with impact of the designs on individuals and groups in the society. The social designers think about balancing the needs of an individual client with the needs of the overall community in the society. On every design project for the social designer, the social, economic and the environmental impacts are of high importance. This is unlike urban designs and placemaking where the market economy is their own point of consideration due to the profits that result from it. Importance of social designs Social designs are important since the designer has their social responsibility at heart. The main aim of a social designer is to ensure that the economic, social and economic aspects of the community members are enhanced through these designs (Harvey 2009). The social designs contribute to the improvement of the well-being of the society members and their livelihood. The designs are inspired by the ideas of others with similar responsibility of transforming the society through great designs. In the sense of responsibility, the social designers can contribute to environmental safety by choosing carefully the materials they use. The social designers are responsible designers who design for the sake of their communities’ requirements as opposed to their own wants. The reason is that some urban designers and placemaking design according to what will sell fast. Often, they do not consider the preferences of their consumers as long as their designs will set out to as many people as possible at a high rate. Social design also incorporates strategic thinking, since they lead to human capabilities which in turn result into the well-being of these individuals in the society (Irving 2013). One of the main disadvantages arising from social design is that the designer has to understand the cultural values and norms of the society conflicting with these values could result into the society members failing to accept these designs. Moreover, individual clients might share the same cultural values; it is difficult for them to have the same sense of place. The reason is that the needs and preferences of the community members may differ, and this may not be a consideration in social designs. Why urban design does not necessarily start with social design From the previous definition, urban design concerns designing to shape various cities, villages and towns. The design focuses on designs of various large scale buildings to ensure that the urban areas are attractive, functional and more sustainable for urban dwellers. Urban design is more concerned with enhancing the connectivity of people, movement, nature and places with the built fabric (Kaufman & Rawlinson 2008). It ensures the creation of places that enhance a great deal of beauty and even identity. The emerging theory of urban design deals with the design and the overall management of the public spaces, enhancing how the public place is used and also experienced. Public space is the spaces used on a day-to-day basis by the members of the public which include parks and various plazas in the urban areas. Some of the aspects that are considered to be privately owned also contribute to public spaces and are also considered in the theory of urban design. Thus, the various movements of urban designs are destined to create sustainable environments in the urban centers with various structures that are long lasting and ones that create a great sense of livelihood for their inhabitants. New urbanism is one defined form of the current form of walkable urbanism. This approach enables the successful reduction of various environmental impacts by building and enhancing the preservation of cities that enhance sustainable means of transport. It is evident through the fact that residents in compact urban regions drive for fewer miles and have lower environmental impacts compared to residents in the sprawling suburbs. Often, public spaces are subjected to varying responsibilities of management with varying interests of the property owners nearby. Sometimes there are also the competing requirements of nearby users. Therefore, it is important that the urban designers in need of the construction and the management of these public spaces demands for the negotiation and consultations across the differing spheres (Cowan n.d). Such urban designers lack the artistic liberty or level of control present in other similar professions including architecture. The detail considered in these designs often depends on the wants of the clients. The designers may require them to prepare various design guidelines and are regulated by various bodies of regulatory frameworks. From this perspective, urban design may require the design of certain structures thus overlapping with other similar professions. In other cases, it incorporates place management to assist in the usage and overall maintenance of urban areas and even spaces. Moreover, urban design is concerned with analyzing, organizing and even shaping urban form to enable the rich and coherent experience of the inhabitants. This is the overall interdependence and development of both the city and its citizens. Thus, creative interventions are important in shaping the growth of the city in addition to its change (Dawson 2007). This also elaborates the identity of the city and its inhabitants. Thus, it is important to consider that social design is not the first priority in urban designs. The reason is that urban designs do not necessarily consider their societal obligations while making the designs. They are more concerned with coming up with designs that are beneficial to them and to the inhabitants at large (Harrington 2009). Despite the competitiveness of various urban designers in the industry, the citizen risk inhabiting poorly designed urban structures in due to malicious aim of the urban designers to complete the structures at the fastest time possible for them to begin gaining profits. Moreover, they are some urban designers who minimize on the cost of urban designing thus coming up with poorly designed structures that are not in line with the needs of their clients. Placemaking, on its part is a movement that is able to re imagine the public spaces in every community (Bennett 2003). It inspires individuals to create and improve their public places and creates a connection between people and the places that they share. Through placemaking, individuals are able to shape their public realm to maximize on their shared values. It is rooted deep in the participation of their community, an involvement the design, planning and even the management of public spaces. In addition to creating better urban designs in the public spaces, placemaking is able to facilitate the development of creative patterns and activities. Individuals continually and collectively shape the world through placemaking (Harmack n.d). It is important to consider that placemaking maximizes on the inspirations and potential of a community to create a public space that promote the happiness and comfort of these individuals. For that reason, placemaking does not prioritize social design since the first priority is the happiness, comfort and well-being of the inhabitants. There are a number of defining principles that are required to be addressed if the urban designer to achieve high quality designs and a quality sense of placemaking (Adovasio 2005). One of the principles is character which is the absolute requirement to encourage a response of the sensitive nature to allow each of the urban designed places to have a given distinctive character. Secondly, there is the principle of the quality of public places in a need to develop the public spaces to be attractive and safe for the inhabitants. The urban designs and placemaking are also aimed at enhancing the ease of movement where there is a high level of accessibility by coming up with places that connect with each other and that are easy to navigate (Piuma 2012). Finally, there urban designs and placemaking are designed to encourage the development of designs and places that are easily adaptable to the changing circumstances and one that promotes diversity among its inhabitants. Urban designs incorporates the way places work including important matters that include community safety. It is a key to enhance sustainable developments and ensure that the economic life in the area is able to flourish. Good design helps in creating lively places consisting of distinctive character and develops public spaces that are safe and easily accessible. Thinking clearly about the way the urban designs are made has its benefits (Black n.d.). Some of them are the overall traditional concerns of good planning and others are new. Urban design concern more than one profession or interest group who includes architects, planners and civil engineers. The most effective way of promoting successful and also sustainable regeneration of placemaking is to think critically about urban design from the start of the planning and the development process. If the designers leave urban designs until the late stages, the process can become slow, costly and wasteful resulting into low quality designs. Moreover, successful urban designs require the designer to fully understand the conditions under which the effective decisions are made and the development delivered in the desired manner (Sandalack 2007). There are many factors that determine and influence the overall outcome of the process of design and the placemaking process. The reason is that success does not happen by chance. The factors include: a clear framework that is often provided by the development plans including the supplementary guidelines which are consistently delivered; an overall sensitive response to the surrounding local context; judgment of the feasible economic and the market conditions and imaginative design approach by the designers and the managers of the planning process. The factors are all crucial if they are applied together. However, it is possible for a proposed development to conflict with the aspirations of the good design according to the local authorities of the region. If the urban designers are not concerned with feasibility with as much weight as it deserves, then the commercial purpose of the development is likely to fail. Moreover, if the design approach happens to be wrong, then the opportunities of the site may be missed resulting into poor development (Shibley 2008). The planning system encourages the urban designers to come up with good and high quality designs in all the areas that the urban designers are interested in. the central aim of good design involves securing good designs in the appropriate areas. If the urban designers come up with poor designs, it is important for the local authorities in planning to reject the poor designs. Achieving good designs is dependent on the skills of the designer and the commitment he or she has to come up with good designs for all individuals concerned with development. The availability of good guidance to good practice is not a substitute for the skills of the professional designers and their ability to make an analysis of places and their understanding of how they are used and experienced to meet the preferences and the needs of the inhabitants. The reason is that the objectives of urban designs are abstract and only becoming useful if they are translated into development by the best urban designers out there. Urban designs take the form of buildings, spaces and the structures thus influencing the patterns of use and the activity of movement in a certain place. It changes and influences the experiences of individuals who live or even work in the region. This development process results into good designed places. The reason is that the positive features visible in a place and its people contribute to the special character and sense of identity for the place and its people. They include such aspects as landscape, patterns of life of individuals and any other factors that brings out the difference between a place and the next. The best places are often memorable with a character that people can easily recognize with and appreciate. Many of the places that we now see as distinctive grew in response to the available local circumstances. Where such local distinctiveness is ignored, then the new developments may fail to show the creativeness of the urban designs involved in its design. It is important for a design to respond to the site’s sensitivity and setting thus creating a place that is valued and highly pleasing for the eye (VanBurkleo 2007). Designing with the local distinctiveness in mind involves reconciliation of the local practices and the latest technologies, types of buildings and the preferences of their inhabitants. Where the significant local tradition is lacking, then the challenge to come up with a distinctive place may lack. For a design to be successful, it is important for its vision to be candid. This assists the designs and also aides in later stages of marketing and promotion for the designs. The designs should include all the elements of its desired location to implement its vision and objectives of the designs. It is important for the design of the place to be precise and unto the point to be in line with the preferences of the inhabitants of the area. Thus, considering the aspects given above, there are more reasons that urban designs start with in the context of placemaking and community design is not among them. The issue of community design may appear later in the course of the designs but not in the beginning of the designs. It is important for the urban designers to consider their promises to the inhabitants and deliver to those promises. There are various advantages that arise from this form of urban design that does not start with social design. The advantages include promoting diversity of the compatible forms of developments and users. Secondly, it enhances the adaptability of the development and the places to fit into the changing circumstances (O’Connor 2008). Third, it ensures that the clarity of development that provides easily accessible routes and landmarks is easily understood. It enables ease of movement since it makes it easier for local permeability by coming up with places that make it easy for people to connect and navigate through. It also enhances the development of public spaces that are attractive and safe for all its inhabitants. In addition it ensures that the continuity of the visible street frontage is achieved to achieve the desired enclosure and well defined spaces. The disadvantages include the ability of these urban designers coming up with designs that only enhance their corporate competitiveness. Some of them only come up with design that will sell at a faster late and give little consideration to the needs of their clients. Secondly, failure to consider the social designs could result into the urban designs coming up with designs that may conflict with the societal beliefs and values. This could be a disadvantage for them since many of the community members may fail to purchase such designs. Conclusion Placemaking involves creating spaces that enhance the safety, comfort and happiness of individuals. It capitalizes on the potential of a community’s local assets, potential and inspiration. In placemaking, considerations of the social-cultural activities that take place in the designed space are important. Urban designs, on the other hand, involve a collaborative and a multidisciplinary process undertaken to shape the physical setting of various cities, villages and towns (Kaufman 2009). The issue of community design may appear later in the course of the designs but not in the beginning of the designs. Successful urban designs require the designer to fully understand the conditions under which the effective decisions are made and the development delivered in the desired manner. There are many factors that determine and influence the overall outcome of the process of design and the placemaking process. The reason is that success does not happen by chance. Thus, social design is not the first to consider when doing urban design and placemaking. The reason is that it is difficult for inhabitants in a certain area to have the same sense of place. Individual clients for the different designs experience multiple and disjointed areas with poor relationships among them. There exists a difference between social policy, expectations of the reform is and real-place making capacity (Haggas 2013). Bibliography Adovasio, JM. 2005, ‘Maya Cities,’ LJ Library Journal, 100, 22, p. 2337. Black, CF. n.d., ‘Florentine New Towns: Urban Designs in the Late Middle Ages,’ History, 75, 245, p. 481 Bennett, B. 2003, ‘Some Dynamics of Literary Placemaking: An Australian Perspective,’ ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature & Environment, 10, 2, pp. 97-109. Cowan, A. n.d., ‘Urban Design in Western Europe: Regime and Architecture, 900-1900,’ History, 76, 246, p. 93. Dawson, E. 2007, ‘The Great Neighborhood Book: A Do-It-Yourself Guide to Placemaking,’ Library Journal, vole, 132, p. 86. Grabski, J 2008, Sufi City: Urban Design and Archetypes in Touba, Research in African Literatures, vol. 39, no. 2, pp. 179-180. 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