Research Methods Workshop

Urban Anti-Urbanism in the 20th Century

Course Leader

David Mountain

Anti-urbanism is an urban phenomenon, expressing key contradictions within urbanisation. In the 20th Century, anti-urbanism expressed profound crises affecting categories of 19th Century modernity (industrialisation, enlightenment, liberalism, urbanisation) and gave form to new initiatives to reshape society. Over time, different conceptions of urbanisation and anti-urbanism have located ‘problems’ and ‘solutions’ in different places. On occasion, ideas which to some remained solutions, became, to others, problems. This course offered a new, historically-grounded and interdisciplinary account of anti-urbanism and its relationship to urbanisation, modernity and political change. It contextualised contemporary urbanisation challenges facing society, and offered to develop critical and historical apparatuses for understanding urbanisation and related issues in the present.

The course introduced students to various intellectual and methodological approaches for conducting research, intersecting historical and contemporary disciplines. Through group and individual research projects investigating and analysing anti-urbanism past and/or present, students gained experience of applying architectural and urban conceptual apparatuses to original, self-directed areas of study. The course content was structured around three moments in 20th Century Britain when new, influential ideas about architecture and urbanism were motivated by discontents with urbanisation: The origins of the modern suburb; Mid-century reassessments of community; and Concentrated urbanisation.

Students

Kester Miller

Mohsin Ali

Muhammad Amir Safwan Bin Mahayudin

Rhian Marged Jones

Sadiyah Tijani-Stapleton

Shadi Mohammed H Albaity

Shiwen Ng

Thady Smyth

Weng Lam

Xie Zhiyuan

Zhou Jingyi

9

The Relationship between Romantic and Progressive Thought in 20th Century Urban Planning 1

The Relationship between Romantic and Progressive Thought in 20th Century Urban Planning 2

Milton Keynes is nothing if not contradictory, an infusion of organic and factitious landscapes reminiscent of Victorian romanticism, juxtaposed with the rectilinear vision of modernist pioneers and progressivism. Not only a functional space to relieve the chronic housing problem of the post-war years, the third-generation British New Town dreams more ambitiously than any urban planning project of its time – building on a breadth of avant-garde concepts as well as some established ‘British’ principles.

The Relationship between Romantic and Progressive Thought in 20th Century Urban Planning 3

Although the Arts and Crafts (1880-1920) romantic aesthetic seemingly has little in common with Bauhaus’ (1919-1933) designs for mass-produced objects inspired by Euclidean archetypes – typically characterised by clean lines, abstract shapes, and minimum ornamentation – their commonality is underpinned by their shared values of eradicating class divisions caused by industrialisation and political regimes. Gropius made the transition from Morris’ romantic idealism to pragmatism by embracing the machine as a tool and symbol of universal social harmony and physical well-being.

The Relationship between Romantic and Progressive Thought in 20th Century Urban Planning 4

A juxtaposition of Arts and Crafts and Bauhaus inspired ideals are found throughout Milton Keynes. The grid layout for example resembles Gropius’ notion that technology may be used to achieve the goal of social equality and harmony, yet is balanced with an organic British landscaping concept that echoed Morris’ love of nature and beauty to integrate a romantic ideology into a progressive planning theory in order to build a sustainable, healthy society. The light-filled, permeable, and Bauhausian Shopping Centre has shades of Morrisian ideas within the landscaping and aesthetic of the interiors. A clear formulation of this is the expansive vegetation and planting, which aims to promote environmental encounters between humans and nature to advocate a healthier used experience. We see how the tall trees fit comfortably within the curved cast iron, rectilinear steel, and extensive glazing, which gave credit to their modern predecessors in their clean lines.

The Changing Face of Nature 1

THE CHANGING FACE OF NATURE is an investigation into the commodification of nature as a tool to sell suburban living in the 20th century Britain. By focusing on primary sources such as marketing images, adverts and photos, we explored early ideas of 'nature' as a major force in selling migration to new settlements and how that has shaped our perception of nature in urban and suburban environments.

The Changing Face of Nature 2

Welwyn Garden City
The mutual promise of the natural landscape for a refreshing, wholesome lifestyle in Welwyn Garden City has been the key marketing strategy for migration, and from supporting literature, it is evident that this ideal was the town planner’s objective to remove the housing congestion in London. Rather than portraying greenery as boulevards of neatly trimmed trees, the visual material illustrated nature as lush and mature; to represent a balanced and healthier living within the natural beauty of sceneries alongside the provision of jobs and amenities in the new garden city, as an alternative from overcrowded, polluted cities.

The Changing Face of Nature 3

Metroland & Interwar Suburbs
Metro-land and the inter-war suburbs, utilising extensive and romanticist imagery of nature and landscapes, effectively marketed and helped create the commuter lifestyle for the working and middle classes (which was a particularly smart business move when coming from a railway company who would supply the journey). This demonstrates how marketing nature and all the promises that it had come to be associated with – health, fresh air, community – can powerfully influence urban planning and the way people view nature and landscape. People of all classes could now live in a property with a private landscape and work in a city, something that had previously been a privilege of the upper classes.

The Changing Face of Nature 4

Milton Keynes
Milton Keynes portrayed the change from strictly gridded landscaping in the city centre to wilder rural landscaping areas further out of the town. MK has vast parks and gardens, allowing for numerous social and cultural activities as they aimed MK to be a "forest city". As our perception of nature is cultivated throughout the development of new towns, the translation of how nature can serve the community and living surroundings for the environment to improve human wellbeing is also considered. By integrating nature into the urban surroundings, the functional characteristics of the designs were considered to ease the new town occupants and promotional material focused heavily on vegetation, even prescribing the plants to be used within the shopping centre.

The Changing Face of Nature 5

Nature and landscaping were mainly portrayed for their visual aesthetic and health benefits. Whereas in the 21st Century era, with the advancement of technology, nature has also been taken along the lines of sustainability. Its application in Eddington was related to broader environmental, ecological, and climate issues, beyond the immediate needs of people. This is a present-day example of integrating residences into nature by emphasising the idea of ecological and biodiverse spaces alongside green infrastructure to improve the environmental and social needs.

How Resilient is the Garden City Model when faced with a Global Pandemic 1

How Resilient is the Garden City Model when faced with a Global Pandemic 2

The Garden City Movement was created by Sir Ebenezer Howard in 1898 through the publishing of his revolutionary book ‘To‐morrow: a peaceful path to real reform’ to create an antidote to London — at the time a dark, fetid place with social inequities, toxic air and water, overcrowding and rampant infectious disease ’ following the industrial revolution and a devastating cholera epidemic which wiped out a large portion of London’s population.
The idea of resilience refers to the ability of an entity or system to ‘recover from and position elastically’ following a disturbance or disruption of some kind. When relating this concept to urban planning, the resilient city refers to the efficient and effective nature that a city can absorb, recover and prepare for future shocks such as a global pandemic. The use of the term ‘urban resilience’ has not only been popularised following the COVID‐19 pandemic but has increasingly been part of urban planning discourse due to increased environmental concerns, this has resulted in close parallels forming between ‘resilience’ and the concept of sustainability, with claims being made that, ‘resilience is to the 2000s and 2010s what sustainability was to the 1980s and 1990s.’

How Resilient is the Garden City Model when faced with a Global Pandemic 2

Preparedness
Scattering urban populations and promoting social equality are two fundamental reasons for the resilience of garden cities when faced with a global pandemic. The residents no longer have to live in slums or crowded communities because they can get excellent job opportunities outside of the city. Therefore, dwellings have adequate spaces to maintain social distance during epidemics & pandemics. In addition, social equality in the garden city means citizens have equitable access to jobs, necessities, and health services. Each infected person can get effective treatment. The cases in the city can reach a balanced state of dynamic clarity, maintaining the resilience of the city and medical systems during the pandemic.
Garden city model is relatively independent of global connectivity. People do not need to travel frequently between cities and the countryside searching for well‐paying positions and low‐cost accommodation. The housing and garden system in the inner ring and farmland and industries in the outer ring create a liveable, beautiful, self‐sufficient environmwent in the garden city model. When an epidemic hits the garden city, the connectivity to the world can be temporarily cut off. The town can remain self‐sufficient relies on the healthy internal operations of farms, medical facilities, and other infrastructure, which is beneficial for slowing the spread of the epidemic.

How Resilient is the Garden City Model when faced with a Global Pandemic 3

Mitigation
The walkable green spaces and cycling promote the resilience of the garden city. This kind of walkable landscape has positive influences on the mental health of residents and increases the importance of specialising pedestrian and cycling routes within cities [Raj et al, 2021]. Due to the negative influences of public transportation on the transmissibility of diseases, those urban planning strategies give people multiple choices for travelling, especially during the
pandemic, and minimise the epidemic's impact on traffic, reflecting the resilience of the garden city.
Response
The horizontal expansion minimises the chances of disease spread in comparison to a vertical expansion like a high‐rise as the density in horizontal planning is significantly lower. Also, the horizontal expansion of cities allows to set up the healthcare facilities like Testing sites, Quarantine Shelters, Temporary Hospitals in a better way to reach the infected people with the minimum amount of interaction between healthcare staff and patients that help both in social distancing and reducing the possibility of a pandemic spreading on the city.