Rethinking the Urban Square
3.2.1 Types of Public Squares Maurits Voorhorst in his Dutch book ‘Logische Ruimte, eenduidige en authentieke stedebouw’ (‘Logical Space, unambiguous and authentic urban design’) described squares. He determines the event square, the spatial square, the traffic square and the urban square. (Voorhorst, Irregular Squares, 2012) The event square: a square that’s designed for intensive use at events, but is empty when there’s nothing to do. Every city needs a place for events, but people do not feel pleasant on a big and empty event square. The spatial square: a square in front of a building to create a view to the building. These (mostly little) squares give historical centres it’s typical identity as they act as appreciation spaces for the structure. The traffic square: cross points and parking areas dominate traffic squares. These areas are primary designed for the practical use and not for the spatial effect of the urban volume. The urban square: a square where people meet each other, interact and connect, want to stay on, eat something or just sit down on a bench or wall. (Voorhorst, Irregular Squares, 2012) Two of the most influential theories were outlined by Paul Zucker and Sitte. From his work on squares Zucker was able to distinguish five archetypal forms: the closed square where the space is self-contained; the dominated square where the space is directed towards the main building; the nuclear square where space is formed around a centre; grouped squares where spatial units are combined to form larger compositions; and the amorphous square where space is unlimited. (J.C.Moughtin, 2003) For Sitte, enclosure was taken as the prerequisite of the square and he concluded that there were only two types of square in formal terms, the character of either being determined by the nature of the dominant building. The two categories of square distinguished by Sitte were, “the deep type and the wide type . . . whether a plaza is deep or wide usually becomes apparent when the observer stands opposite the major building that dominates the whole layout”. For Sitte both the amorphous square and the space formed around a central object being outside his definition of the subject matter would have little meaning for him. Grouped squares on the other hand were the object of much attention by Sitte. They were, however, not thought by him to be a generic form but more simply one manner in which squares could be related to each other and to the urban fabric in general. (J.C.Moughtin, 2003)
Figure 37: Types of Public Squares (Author)
Yashita Khanna|Fifth Year B.Arch.|L.S.Raheja School of Architecture
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