Decomposing and recomposing urban fabric: The city from the pedestrian point of view

Abstract

Urban fabric is a fundamental small-scale component of urban form with important relations to social, economic or environmental phenomena. It is the result of interplay between buildings, parcels and street segments. Quantitative analysis of urban fabric on a large scale has often privileged selected morphological aspects, linked to micro-climatic or energy consumption issues. The planning approach has privileged aerial rather than pedestrian point of view. This paper proposes a methodology for the recognition and characterization of urban fabric taking a different stance. After the definition of a new network-based partition of urban space based on the pedestrian point of view, we describe an innovative computational method: firstly, urban fabric is broken down in its components, and shape-perception indicators are computed through geoprocessing techniques. Secondly, spatial patterns on the street network are identified with geostatistical analysis. Finally, Bayesian clustering is carried out for the re-composition, identification of urban fabric types and qualification of sub-spaces within the city.