Embracing Urban Evolution

Posted on July 8, 2011 by Michael Batty

describes a rather innovative approach to designing the organic city. Ten architecture offices in Holland and China built a city in relay through 10 stages effectively mirroring a process of organic emergence rather than a strict top down design. Click here for the article by Adrian Hornsby.
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The Heart of the City

Posted on July 6, 2011 by Michael Batty
Written by Victor Gruen in 1964 who said “I can visualize a metropolitan organism in which cells, each one consisting of a nucleus and a protoplasm, are combined into clusterizations to form specialised organs like towns…..” He portrayed this idealised structure left & this influenced Walt Disney click here.
Posted in Evolution, Morphology, Transport | Leave a comment

Cities as Brains

Posted on June 30, 2011 by Michael Batty
As cities get bigger, their capacity to innovate (hence their wealth) appears to scale super-linearly (with their size).  But the idea that ‘big cities’ have ‘big brains’ and are smarter, is problematic as is their scaling and allometry. Read Changizi & Destefano.
Posted in Allometry, Networks, Scaling | Leave a comment

Movies Are Now Online

Posted on June 29, 2011 by Michael Batty
Put my experiments with movies online. The current one is that based on linking our desktop LUTI model to Google Earth. Click here. No sound yet and still getting used to the capture. Click to explore the full Tyndall & Arcadia movies with golden oldies.
Posted in Animations, Computer Graphics, Urban (LUTI) Models | Leave a comment

The Oldest Flow Map

Posted on June 27, 2011 by Michael Batty
…. according to the great cartographer Arthur Robinson, the two maps of traffic between Dublin and the rest of Ireland by Lt. Harness of the British Army in 1837, are the oldest. Mapped for the Irish Railway Commissioners prior to construction of the railway. Are these actually the first?
Posted in Flows, Fluxes, Transport | Leave a comment