How geoweb fossils become unusable

Once upon a time, Streetmap.co.uk was one of the most popular Web Mapping sites in the UK, competing successfully with the biggest rival at the time, Multimap. Moreover, it was ranked second in The Daily Telegraph list of leading mapping sites in October 2000 and described at ‘Must be one of the most useful services on […]

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The techniques of urban design- Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects

 
Image 1. The book cover of ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’
 
What is the basic knowledge for urban design? Which techniques are necessary for designing decent urban spaces? ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’, written by German architect Leonhard Schenk, is navigating the answer of these questions.

The book is structured along three parts,
1) General principles of urban design
2) Practical techniques for designing cities with relative examples

3) Three sensible examples that are recently constructed and well evaluated   – Hamburg (Germany), Tubingen (Germany) and Belval (Luxemburg)
When people want to make an overview from the basic theory to the completed projects, it seems a well organised book to look through all parts. 
 
The author argues that the most urban design projects have been realised by competitions, and two factors should be incorporated to win the competitions. On the one hand, projects need to satisfy the demands of the client and the jury. On the other hand, the functionality, the design and the representation capacity of projects have to be promoted by themselves. This argument clearly indicates the direction of the book. Over 350 pages, the author illustrates in detail the systematic methods for creating urban spatial organisations and visually attractive designs.
 
What an interesting point of this book is the explaining principles of urban design step by step, particularly in the Chapter 1 and 2. For example, ‘the law of similarity’ describes that ‘elements that resemble one another in the form are more readily experienced as belonging together than elements are. In addition, similar elements result in more uniform groups than dissimilar ones’. (P.21, See image 3) The principles demonstrate not the characters of each element but the natures of the group as a corporate body of the elements. These rules are underestimated because too simple and too obvious. But, we could easily deep in troubles during the design process if we do not keep them in mind. And then, from the Chapter3, the author starts to explain the practical ways of urban design such as designing urban blocks, various grid structures, organising building lots, road systems, designing public space and representation skills. 
 
Image 2. The sample page of Chpter 2. Page 18 and 19

Image 3. The sample page of Chpter 2. Page 20 and 21
 
 
A variety of example images are helpful to understand the intention of the author. The project images of international offices like OMA, BIG and KCAP, and other competition images were considerably selected, and are provided in the right positions depends on the topics. When the possibilities of diagrams are expressed to show complex relationships, for instance, the KCAP’s first prize winning diagrams for FredericiaC competition are suggested as a suitable case.(See image 8) This brings good chances not only for analysing some parts of each project but also for watching highly correlated site plans with the parts.   
 
Image 4. Good project images are helpful to understand the intention of the author. Page 40 and 41

Image 5. Sample pages. Page 74 and 75

Image 6. Sample pages. Page 110 and 111

Image 7. Sample pages. Page 276 and 277

Image 8. Sample pages. Page 280 and 281
 
 
The final chapter is a weak side of the book. Much writing about the ways of urban design is focusing on the designing physical urban spaces through the pages. However, planning issues, such as the process of urban regeneration and the consortium structure, are primarily discussed rather than design issues in the last chapter which analyse successful cases of Hamburg, Tubingen and Belval. If the book places more emphasis on the design issues like the spatial characteristics of each city, it would be more adequate with the original intent of the book. Also, most project images are from the European context while some Asian projects are included. In other regions where have different geographical and societal backgrounds, more careful approaches would be demanded to apply the ways of the book. 
 
Overall, ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’ provides a good level of overview for urban design. Definitely, it is a nice reference for people who are interested in urban design and its methods. This book was honoured the best architectural books among 242 participants from DAM Architectural Book Award that was held by Deutsches Architektur museum and the Frankfurt Book Fair.
Here is the basic information of the book, and you can find more information from the links.

Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, ProjectsHardcover: 356 pages


Publisher: Birkhauser Verlag AG (25 July 2013)


Language: English


ISBN-10: 3034613253


ISBN-13: 978-3034613255


Product Dimensions: 24.4 x 17.5 x 3 cm


Amazon UK http://bit.ly/KRenmV


 

Continue reading »

The techniques of urban design- Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects

 
Image 1. The book cover of ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’
 
What is the basic knowledge for urban design? Which techniques are necessary for designing decent urban spaces? ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’, written by German architect Leonhard Schenk, is navigating the answer of these questions.

The book is structured along three parts,
1) General principles of urban design
2) Practical techniques for designing cities with relative examples

3) Three sensible examples that are recently constructed and well evaluated   – Hamburg (Germany), Tubingen (Germany) and Belval (Luxemburg)
When people want to make an overview from the basic theory to the completed projects, it seems a well organised book to look through all parts. 
 
The author argues that the most urban design projects have been realised by competitions, and two factors should be incorporated to win the competitions. On the one hand, projects need to satisfy the demands of the client and the jury. On the other hand, the functionality, the design and the representation capacity of projects have to be promoted by themselves. This argument clearly indicates the direction of the book. Over 350 pages, the author illustrates in detail the systematic methods for creating urban spatial organisations and visually attractive designs.
 
What an interesting point of this book is the explaining principles of urban design step by step, particularly in the Chapter 1 and 2. For example, ‘the law of similarity’ describes that ‘elements that resemble one another in the form are more readily experienced as belonging together than elements are. In addition, similar elements result in more uniform groups than dissimilar ones’. (P.21, See image 3) The principles demonstrate not the characters of each element but the natures of the group as a corporate body of the elements. These rules are underestimated because too simple and too obvious. But, we could easily deep in troubles during the design process if we do not keep them in mind. And then, from the Chapter3, the author starts to explain the practical ways of urban design such as designing urban blocks, various grid structures, organising building lots, road systems, designing public space and representation skills. 
 
Image 2. The sample page of Chpter 2. Page 18 and 19

Image 3. The sample page of Chpter 2. Page 20 and 21
 
 
A variety of example images are helpful to understand the intention of the author. The project images of international offices like OMA, BIG and KCAP, and other competition images were considerably selected, and are provided in the right positions depends on the topics. When the possibilities of diagrams are expressed to show complex relationships, for instance, the KCAP’s first prize winning diagrams for FredericiaC competition are suggested as a suitable case.(See image 8) This brings good chances not only for analysing some parts of each project but also for watching highly correlated site plans with the parts.   
 
Image 4. Good project images are helpful to understand the intention of the author. Page 40 and 41

Image 5. Sample pages. Page 74 and 75

Image 6. Sample pages. Page 110 and 111

Image 7. Sample pages. Page 276 and 277

Image 8. Sample pages. Page 280 and 281
 
 
The final chapter is a weak side of the book. Much writing about the ways of urban design is focusing on the designing physical urban spaces through the pages. However, planning issues, such as the process of urban regeneration and the consortium structure, are primarily discussed rather than design issues in the last chapter which analyse successful cases of Hamburg, Tubingen and Belval. If the book places more emphasis on the design issues like the spatial characteristics of each city, it would be more adequate with the original intent of the book. Also, most project images are from the European context while some Asian projects are included. In other regions where have different geographical and societal backgrounds, more careful approaches would be demanded to apply the ways of the book. 
 
Overall, ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’ provides a good level of overview for urban design. Definitely, it is a nice reference for people who are interested in urban design and its methods. This book was honoured the best architectural books among 242 participants from DAM Architectural Book Award that was held by Deutsches Architektur museum and the Frankfurt Book Fair.
Here is the basic information of the book, and you can find more information from the links.

Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, ProjectsHardcover: 356 pages


Publisher: Birkhauser Verlag AG (25 July 2013)


Language: English


ISBN-10: 3034613253


ISBN-13: 978-3034613255


Product Dimensions: 24.4 x 17.5 x 3 cm


Amazon UK http://bit.ly/KRenmV


 

Continue reading »

The techniques of urban design- Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects

 
Image 1. The book cover of ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’
 
What is the basic knowledge for urban design? Which techniques are necessary for designing decent urban spaces? ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’, written by German architect Leonhard Schenk, is navigating the answer of these questions.

The book is structured along three parts,
1) General principles of urban design
2) Practical techniques for designing cities with relative examples

3) Three sensible examples that are recently constructed and well evaluated   – Hamburg (Germany), Tubingen (Germany) and Belval (Luxemburg)
When people want to make an overview from the basic theory to the completed projects, it seems a well organised book to look through all parts. 
 
The author argues that the most urban design projects have been realised by competitions, and two factors should be incorporated to win the competitions. On the one hand, projects need to satisfy the demands of the client and the jury. On the other hand, the functionality, the design and the representation capacity of projects have to be promoted by themselves. This argument clearly indicates the direction of the book. Over 350 pages, the author illustrates in detail the systematic methods for creating urban spatial organisations and visually attractive designs.
 
What an interesting point of this book is the explaining principles of urban design step by step, particularly in the Chapter 1 and 2. For example, ‘the law of similarity’ describes that ‘elements that resemble one another in the form are more readily experienced as belonging together than elements are. In addition, similar elements result in more uniform groups than dissimilar ones’. (P.21, See image 3) The principles demonstrate not the characters of each element but the natures of the group as a corporate body of the elements. These rules are underestimated because too simple and too obvious. But, we could easily deep in troubles during the design process if we do not keep them in mind. And then, from the Chapter3, the author starts to explain the practical ways of urban design such as designing urban blocks, various grid structures, organising building lots, road systems, designing public space and representation skills. 
 
Image 2. The sample page of Chpter 2. Page 18 and 19

Image 3. The sample page of Chpter 2. Page 20 and 21
 
 
A variety of example images are helpful to understand the intention of the author. The project images of international offices like OMA, BIG and KCAP, and other competition images were considerably selected, and are provided in the right positions depends on the topics. When the possibilities of diagrams are expressed to show complex relationships, for instance, the KCAP’s first prize winning diagrams for FredericiaC competition are suggested as a suitable case.(See image 8) This brings good chances not only for analysing some parts of each project but also for watching highly correlated site plans with the parts.   
 
Image 4. Good project images are helpful to understand the intention of the author. Page 40 and 41

Image 5. Sample pages. Page 74 and 75

Image 6. Sample pages. Page 110 and 111

Image 7. Sample pages. Page 276 and 277

Image 8. Sample pages. Page 280 and 281
 
 
The final chapter is a weak side of the book. Much writing about the ways of urban design is focusing on the designing physical urban spaces through the pages. However, planning issues, such as the process of urban regeneration and the consortium structure, are primarily discussed rather than design issues in the last chapter which analyse successful cases of Hamburg, Tubingen and Belval. If the book places more emphasis on the design issues like the spatial characteristics of each city, it would be more adequate with the original intent of the book. Also, most project images are from the European context while some Asian projects are included. In other regions where have different geographical and societal backgrounds, more careful approaches would be demanded to apply the ways of the book. 
 
Overall, ‘Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, Projects’ provides a good level of overview for urban design. Definitely, it is a nice reference for people who are interested in urban design and its methods. This book was honoured the best architectural books among 242 participants from DAM Architectural Book Award that was held by Deutsches Architektur museum and the Frankfurt Book Fair.
Here is the basic information of the book, and you can find more information from the links.

Designing Cities: Basics, Principles, ProjectsHardcover: 356 pages


Publisher: Birkhauser Verlag AG (25 July 2013)


Language: English


ISBN-10: 3034613253


ISBN-13: 978-3034613255


Product Dimensions: 24.4 x 17.5 x 3 cm


Amazon UK http://bit.ly/KRenmV


 

Continue reading »

CALL FOR PAPERS: Population Geographies of Childhood &Youth (Fourth Biannual British-Irish Population Conference), 12-13 May 2014

Tweet   CALL FOR PAPERS Population Geographies of Childhood and Youth Fourth Biannual British-Irish Population Conference 12th-13th May 2014 Hosted by Department of Geography, Swansea University under the auspices of the Population Geography Research Group of the RGS-IBG   Papers are invited for a forthcoming conference on any aspects of the Population Geographies of Childhood […]

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Assertions on crowdsourced geographic information & citizen science #3

Following the two previous assertions, namely that: ‘you can be supported by a huge crowd for a very short time, or by few for a long time, but you can’t have a huge crowd all of the time (unless data collection is passive)’ (original post here) And ‘All information sources are heterogeneous, but some are more […]

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Globe

I’m now the proud owner of this lovely green glass globe paperweight – it was my prize from the web map category of the mapping competition at the FOSS4G conference last year, but it’s taken me this long to finally get my hands on it, as I was disappearing on a train before the end […]

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10 Years of London Underground Ridership Data in One Map – The Atlantic Cities

10 Years of London Underground Ridership Data in One Map
The Atlantic Cities
Oliver O’Brien, a researcher at the University College London’s Center for Advanced Spatial Analysis (and the developer behind an equally entrancing global bikeshare visualization), has just put all of these Tube stats online in an in-depth interactive

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10 Years of London Underground Ridership Data in One Map – The Atlantic Cities

10 Years of London Underground Ridership Data in One Map
The Atlantic Cities
Oliver O’Brien, a researcher at the University College London’s Center for Advanced Spatial Analysis (and the developer behind an equally entrancing global bikeshare visualization), has just put all of these Tube stats online in an in-depth interactive

Continue reading »

Animating Ground Overlays in Google Maps iOS SDK

Many maps use overlays to display different types of features on the map. Many examples show old hand drawn maps that have been re-projected to fit on our modern day, online ‘slippy’ map but
very few show these overlays over time. In this tutorial we are going to explore animations using the Google Maps iOS SDK to show the current live weather conditions in the UK.

The Met Office is responsible for reporting the current weather conditions, issuing warnings, and creating forecasts across the UK. They also provide data through their API, called DataPoint, so that
developers can take advantage of the live weather feeds in their apps. I’ve used the ground overlays from DataPoint to create a small iOS application, called Synoptic, to loop around the real-time overlays
and display them on top of a Google Map, very handy if your worried about when it’s going to rain.

Finished App and Source Code

I always find it interesting when these tutorials show you what we’re going to create before digging deep into the code so here is a small animation on the right of the page of what the end product should look like.

What you’re looking at is the real-time precipitation, or rain, observations for the UK on Sunday 19th January 2014. It’s been quite sunny in London today so much of the rain is back home in
the North. You can grab a copy of the code for this tutorial from GitHub.

Before we get started

They’re a few things we need before we can start putting the data onto the map. Firstly, you’ll need an API key for Google Maps iOS SDK and you can access this by turning on the SDK from the
Cloud Console (https://cloud.google.com/console/). If you haven’t created a project yet then click Create Project and give your project a name and a unique id. I have a project called
TestSDK, which I use when I’m playing around with various API’s from Google. Follow the instructions on https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/ios/start#the_google_maps_api_key
for getting your key. If you’ve downloaded the code from GitHub then the bundle identifier is set up as com.stevenjamesgray.Synoptic.

You’ll also need to sign up for a key for DataPoint. Once you’ve
registered for the API they’ll email you a key and your good to go.

Step 1 – Setting up the keys and running the project

When you have your keys and source code then open the project in Xcode and copy and paste your keys into Constants.m (it’s in the Object folder). If the keys are valid then you’ll be able to
build and run the project and you’ll start to download the overlay images and they’ll start to animate. I’ve already setup the mapView in the project but if you haven’t used the Google Maps
iOS SDK before then you should check out Mano Marks excellent HelloMap example on Google Developers Live. This will get you up to speed with creating a MapView and linking it into your project. The only extra part I’ve added is a custom base layer which will be covered in
another blog post.

Downloading the weather data

Datapoint has 2 types of data that can be visualised – observations and forecasts which, naturally, are contained in 2 separate API endpoints. If you look at Constants.m you’ll see the URL
to both endpoints:

NSString* const api_forecast_layers_cap = @"http://datapoint.metoffice.gov.uk/public/data/layer/wxfcs/all/json/capabilities?key=%@";
NSString* const api_obs_layers_cap = @"http://datapoint.metoffice.gov.uk/public/data/layer/wxobs/all/json/capabilities?key=%@";

If you copy the URL and paste it into your browser along with your key you’ll find that this JSON file lists all the layers that are available from the Met Office and where you can fetch the
images from the server. For observations we fetch the LayerName, ImageFormat (for us on iOS it will be png), the Time of the image (the timestamp of the image given by the time array – watch
out for the Z on the end) and most importantly our API key. Once we have constructed this URL we fetch the image.

-(void) selectLayer: (NSString*)layerID withTimeSteps: (NSArray *)timestep_set{
    for(NSString *timestep in timestep_set){

        NSURL *hourlyCall = [NSURL URLWithString: [NSString stringWithFormat: @"http://datapoint.metoffice.gov.uk/public/data/layer/wxobs/%@/png?TIME=%@Z&key=%@", layerID, timestep, MET_OFFICE_API_KEY]];

        NSLog(@"Calling URL: %@", [hourlyCall absoluteString]);
        NSURLRequest *request = [NSURLRequest requestWithURL: hourlyCall];
        AFImageRequestOperation *operation = [[AFImageRequestOperation alloc] initWithRequest:request];
        [operation setCompletionBlockWithSuccess:^(AFHTTPRequestOperation *operation, id responseObject) {

            //Check for a UIImage before adding it to the array
            if([responseObject class] == [UIImage class]){

                // Setup our image object and write it to our array
                SGMetOfficeForecastImage *serverImage = [[SGMetOfficeForecastImage alloc] init];
                serverImage.image = [UIImage imageWithData: operation.responseData];
                serverImage.timestamp = timestep;
                serverImage.timeStep = nil;
                serverImage.layerName = layerID;

                [overlayArray addObject: serverImage];

                // Increment our expected count so that we know when to start playing the animation
                imagesExpected = @([imagesExpected intValue] + 1);
                }
        } failure:^(AFHTTPRequestOperation *operation, NSError *error) {
                //We didn't get the image but that won't stop us!
                imagesExpected = @([imagesExpected intValue] + 1);
                NSLog(@"Couldn't download image.");
        }];

        [operation start];

    // Start the Timer to check that we have all the images we requested downloaded and stored in the layer array
        checkDownloads = [NSTimer scheduledTimerWithTimeInterval: 1 target:self selector:@selector(checkAllImagesHaveDownloaded:) userInfo: [NSNumber numberWithInt: [timestep_set count]] repeats: YES];
    }
}

This code fetches the images asynchronously and adds them into an array for us to use later in the code. We start a timer to check that we have downloaded all of our images before
starting to loop around the images on the map. The observant reader will notice that if we use loop around this array of images then they would be out of sync as we don’t know what order the images are downloaded so we need to sort them before we
show them on the map. This happens inside our checkAllImagesHaveDownloaded function. This is called every second and checks that all the images are downloaded. If we’ve got all the images then we clear the timer,
sort the array and then kick off the animation on the map. We sort the array using a Comparator which will compare the timestamps of each of the objects and orders them in asending order.

if([imagesExpected isEqualToNumber: imageFiles]){
        [checkDownloads invalidate];

        NSArray *sortedArray;
        sortedArray = [overlayArray sortedArrayUsingComparator:^NSComparisonResult(SGMetOfficeForecastImage *a, SGMetOfficeForecastImage *b) {
             return [a.timestamp compare: b.timestamp];
        }];

        overlayArray = [NSMutableArray arrayWithArray: sortedArray]; 
    ...

Animating the Layers on the Map

When we are ready to animate we create yet another timer which will call the updateLayer method every second. This is where the magic happens! The images we have downloaded from
the Met Office have been created to fit the following bounding box: 48° to 61° North and 12° West to 5° East. This is really easy to convert into decimal degrees using the following rule. Anything west of the
meridian is a negative number and anything east is, of course, positive. Now that we know the bounding box then we create references to the bottom left and top right corners of the
image using the following code:

CLLocationCoordinate2D UKSouthWest = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(48.00, -12.00);
CLLocationCoordinate2D UKNorthEast = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(61.00, 5.00);

We grab our current image from the array by using a counter that has been set in the loadView method and then put it on to the map. We set the bearing of the image to 0 (we don’t need
to rotate the image as it’s already in North/South orientation), set the z-index of the image and then add it to the map by setting the ground overlays map property to the mapView we created and set
in the loadView method (our only map object)

GMSCoordinateBounds *uk_overlayBounds = [[GMSCoordinateBounds alloc] initWithCoordinate:UKSouthWest
                                                                             coordinate:UKNorthEast];

GMSGroundOverlay *layerOverlay = [GMSGroundOverlay groundOverlayWithBounds: uk_overlayBounds icon: layerObject.image];
layerOverlay.bearing = 0;
layerOverlay.zIndex = 5  * ([currentLayerIndex intValue] + 1);
layerOverlay.map = mapView;

Increment the counter and check that we haven’t got to the end of the array, if we have then we reset the counter and then wait a second until updateLayer is called again.

// Check if we're at the end of the layerArray and then loop
if([currentLayerIndex intValue] < [overlayArray count] - 1){
    currentLayerIndex = @([currentLayerIndex intValue] + 1);
}else{
    currentLayerIndex = @0;
}

If we run the code like this after we’ve looped around all the images we would get something that looks like this.

Wrong Animation

Unfortunately that’s not quite what we’re looking for! What’s happened is that we have created a new GroundOverlay object and put it on the map above the previous layer without removing the older layer
first. To fix this we need to keep an array of GroundOverlays so that we can remove the layer on the next loop and then remove the old layer from the array. This is done by loop around
the array and setting the map property of the older layer to nil like this:

//Clear the Layers in the MapView
for(GMSGroundOverlay *gO in overlayObjectArray){
    gO.map = nil;
    [overlayObjectArray removeObject: gO];
}

The app is now adding and removing the layers correctly and giving us the illusion of animation on the map.

The complete method to add the current image and remove the old image looks like this:

-(void) updateLayer: (id)selector{
    //Setup the bounds of our layer to place on the map
    CLLocationCoordinate2D UKSouthWest = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(48.00, -12.00);
    CLLocationCoordinate2D UKNorthEast = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(61.00, 5.00);

    //Get next layer and place it on the map
    SGMetOfficeForecastImage *layerObject = [overlayArray objectAtIndex: [currentLayerIndex intValue]];

    //Clear the Layers in the MapView
    for(GMSGroundOverlay *gO in overlayObjectArray){
        gO.map = nil;
        [overlayObjectArray removeObject: gO];
    }

    GMSCoordinateBounds *uk_overlayBounds = [[GMSCoordinateBounds alloc] initWithCoordinate:UKSouthWest
                                                                                 coordinate:UKNorthEast];

    GMSGroundOverlay *layerOverlay = [GMSGroundOverlay groundOverlayWithBounds: uk_overlayBounds icon: layerObject.image];
    layerOverlay.bearing = 0;
    layerOverlay.zIndex = 5  * ([currentLayerIndex intValue] + 1);
    layerOverlay.map = mapView;

    [overlayObjectArray addObject: layerOverlay];

    // Check if we're at the end of the layerArray and then loop
    if([currentLayerIndex intValue] < [overlayArray count] - 1){
           currentLayerIndex = @([currentLayerIndex intValue] + 1);
    }else{
           currentLayerIndex = @0;
    }
}

And there you go, animating ground overlays on Google Maps. I hope you’ve found this tutorial useful and if you have then why not share it with your developer friends or
follow me on Twitter (I’m @frogo) or Google+ (+StevenGray).
If you have any questions about this tutorial then either drop me a line via the social links above and I’ll try my very best to answer them. You can also follow the conversation over on Hacker News

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Assertions on crowdsourced geographic information & citizen science #2

Following the last post, which focused on an assertion about crowdsourced geographic information and citizen science I continue with another observation. As was noted in the previous post, these can be treated as ‘laws’ as they seem to emerge as common patterns from multiple projects in different areas of activity – from citizen science to crowdsourced […]

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From Rhythmanalyst to Rhythmconductor- Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life

 

 

 

 

Image 1. The book cover of ‘Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life’

 
In the book, Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life, French sociologist Henri Lefebvre suggests ‘Rhythm’ as an alternative tool to understand and analyse everyday urban life beyond visual recognition. He argues that we can examine the true nature of cities from the human body, the basic unit of urban life, to substantial urban structures through rhythms.

 

Invisible rhythms are generating, repeating and transforming in cities. Lefebvre categorizes types of rhythm, which deeply intervene the life and make a foundation of law, institution and culture, based on its characteristics. Among them, the author particularly insists to pay attention to two aspects of rhythms that Arrhythmia which is creating discordance between or among two or more rhythms, and Eurhythmia which is staying in the state of harmony and balance. He asserts that it is important to convert Arrhythmia in the city that causes inequality and injustice to Eurhythmia which sustains healthy urban condition.

 

‘Rhythmanlysist’ is a fresh idea from the book published in 1992. Rhythmanlysist hears sounds of the city and reveals hidden systems behind visual images with sensing and analysing the change of spatial aspects in timing. As a rhythmanlysist, Lefebvre investigates Mediterranean cities. He presents some insights that the rhythms of Mediterranean cities are derived from specific geographical and climate environments, and the rhythms have created different political system and exceptional cultural diversity in contrast to Atlantic cities. Physically, it leads the development of plazas and the importance of stairways which link sloping lands.

 

Rhythmanlysist could still be a valuable concept to understand complex urban situations. However, we are living in the digital era. As Mitchell (Mitchell, 1999) denoted, the rhythms of our ordinary life are changing by digital communication. Every day tremendous data, which are invisible and inaudible, are generating, and its flows push us into the massive ocean of heterogeneous rhythms. Therefore, new Rhythmanlysist in the digital age needs other capacities. Capturing the digital data in real time and synthesizing it should be essential requirements to create or maintain Eurhythmia. While the cities of the 20th century needed Rhythmanlysist, now it is the time of ‘Rhythmconductor’ who collects digital rhythms, reorganises its tempos-meters-articulations and resonates new contexts. We can easily find good examples of Rhythmconductor like below.
 

Image 2. London Public Bike share map by Oliver O’Brien. http://bikes.oobrien.com/london/

Image 3. Analysis of Happiness on Twitter during 9th September 2008 to 31stAugust 2011.

Dodds PS,  Harris KD,  Kloumann IM,  Bliss CA,  Danforth CM  (2011) Temporal Patterns of Happiness and Information in a Global Social Network: Hedonometrics and Twitter. PLoS ONE 6(12)

 

This radical change of the rhythm gives an opportunity to redefine the scopes of each social group. Citizens collect and utilize the data by their mobile devices; furthermore, they solve complex urban problems by themselves. (Desouza and Bhagwatwar, 2012) The role of planners is challenging to make new rhythms by spreading effective information and stimulating civic participation using social media instead traditional managers’ role within mainstream planning structures. (Tayebi, 2013) Also, Scientists’ role is shifting. According to Wright (Wright, 2013), scientific researchers had focused to find reasons of urban problems until the last decade, however; their voices are getting stronger to solve problems and provide alternatives in the decision making process with geospatial data and geographical analysis.

 

You can find the detail of Lefebvre’s book from Google and Amazon.

 

Desouza, K C and Bhagwatwar, A, 2012, “Citizen Apps to Solve Complex Urban Problems” Journal of Urban Technology 19(3) 107–136.

Mitchell, W J, 1999 E-topia: “Urban life, Jim–but not as we know it” (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA).

Tayebi, A, 2013, “Planning activism: Using Social Media to claim marginalized citizens’ right to the city” Cities 32 88–93.

Wright, D, 2013, “Bridging the Gap Between Scientists and Policy Makers: Whither Geospatial? | Esri Insider” Esri Insider, http://blogs.esri.com/esri/esri-insider/2013/02/11/bridging-the-gap-between-scientists-and-policy-makers-whither-geospatial/.

 

 

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From Rhythmanalyst to Rhythmconductor- Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life

 

 

 

 

Image 1. The book cover of ‘Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life’

 
In the book, Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life, French sociologist Henri Lefebvre suggests ‘Rhythm’ as an alternative tool to understand and analyse everyday urban life beyond visual recognition. He argues that we can examine the true nature of cities from the human body, the basic unit of urban life, to substantial urban structures through rhythms.

 

Invisible rhythms are generating, repeating and transforming in cities. Lefebvre categorizes types of rhythm, which deeply intervene the life and make a foundation of law, institution and culture, based on its characteristics. Among them, the author particularly insists to pay attention to two aspects of rhythms that Arrhythmia which is creating discordance between or among two or more rhythms, and Eurhythmia which is staying in the state of harmony and balance. He asserts that it is important to convert Arrhythmia in the city that causes inequality and injustice to Eurhythmia which sustains healthy urban condition.

 

‘Rhythmanlysist’ is a fresh idea from the book published in 1992. Rhythmanlysist hears sounds of the city and reveals hidden systems behind visual images with sensing and analysing the change of spatial aspects in timing. As a rhythmanlysist, Lefebvre investigates Mediterranean cities. He presents some insights that the rhythms of Mediterranean cities are derived from specific geographical and climate environments, and the rhythms have created different political system and exceptional cultural diversity in contrast to Atlantic cities. Physically, it leads the development of plazas and the importance of stairways which link sloping lands.

 

Rhythmanlysist could still be a valuable concept to understand complex urban situations. However, we are living in the digital era. As Mitchell (Mitchell, 1999) denoted, the rhythms of our ordinary life are changing by digital communication. Every day tremendous data, which are invisible and inaudible, are generating, and its flows push us into the massive ocean of heterogeneous rhythms. Therefore, new Rhythmanlysist in the digital age needs other capacities. Capturing the digital data in real time and synthesizing it should be essential requirements to create or maintain Eurhythmia. While the cities of the 20th century needed Rhythmanlysist, now it is the time of ‘Rhythmconductor’ who collects digital rhythms, reorganises its tempos-meters-articulations and resonates new contexts. We can easily find good examples of Rhythmconductor like below.
 

Image 2. London Public Bike share map by Oliver O’Brien. http://bikes.oobrien.com/london/

Image 3. Analysis of Happiness on Twitter during 9th September 2008 to 31stAugust 2011.

Dodds PS,  Harris KD,  Kloumann IM,  Bliss CA,  Danforth CM  (2011) Temporal Patterns of Happiness and Information in a Global Social Network: Hedonometrics and Twitter. PLoS ONE 6(12)

 

This radical change of the rhythm gives an opportunity to redefine the scopes of each social group. Citizens collect and utilize the data by their mobile devices; furthermore, they solve complex urban problems by themselves. (Desouza and Bhagwatwar, 2012) The role of planners is challenging to make new rhythms by spreading effective information and stimulating civic participation using social media instead traditional managers’ role within mainstream planning structures. (Tayebi, 2013) Also, Scientists’ role is shifting. According to Wright (Wright, 2013), scientific researchers had focused to find reasons of urban problems until the last decade, however; their voices are getting stronger to solve problems and provide alternatives in the decision making process with geospatial data and geographical analysis.

 

You can find the detail of Lefebvre’s book from Google and Amazon.

 

Desouza, K C and Bhagwatwar, A, 2012, “Citizen Apps to Solve Complex Urban Problems” Journal of Urban Technology 19(3) 107–136.

Mitchell, W J, 1999 E-topia: “Urban life, Jim–but not as we know it” (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA).

Tayebi, A, 2013, “Planning activism: Using Social Media to claim marginalized citizens’ right to the city” Cities 32 88–93.

Wright, D, 2013, “Bridging the Gap Between Scientists and Policy Makers: Whither Geospatial? | Esri Insider” Esri Insider, http://blogs.esri.com/esri/esri-insider/2013/02/11/bridging-the-gap-between-scientists-and-policy-makers-whither-geospatial/.

 

 

Continue reading »

From Rhythmanalyst to Rhythmconductor- Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life

 

 

 

 

Image 1. The book cover of ‘Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life’

 
In the book, Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life, French sociologist Henri Lefebvre suggests ‘Rhythm’ as an alternative tool to understand and analyse everyday urban life beyond visual recognition. He argues that we can examine the true nature of cities from the human body, the basic unit of urban life, to substantial urban structures through rhythms.

 

Invisible rhythms are generating, repeating and transforming in cities. Lefebvre categorizes types of rhythm, which deeply intervene the life and make a foundation of law, institution and culture, based on its characteristics. Among them, the author particularly insists to pay attention to two aspects of rhythms that Arrhythmia which is creating discordance between or among two or more rhythms, and Eurhythmia which is staying in the state of harmony and balance. He asserts that it is important to convert Arrhythmia in the city that causes inequality and injustice to Eurhythmia which sustains healthy urban condition.

 

‘Rhythmanlysist’ is a fresh idea from the book published in 1992. Rhythmanlysist hears sounds of the city and reveals hidden systems behind visual images with sensing and analysing the change of spatial aspects in timing. As a rhythmanlysist, Lefebvre investigates Mediterranean cities. He presents some insights that the rhythms of Mediterranean cities are derived from specific geographical and climate environments, and the rhythms have created different political system and exceptional cultural diversity in contrast to Atlantic cities. Physically, it leads the development of plazas and the importance of stairways which link sloping lands.

 

Rhythmanlysist could still be a valuable concept to understand complex urban situations. However, we are living in the digital era. As Mitchell (Mitchell, 1999) denoted, the rhythms of our ordinary life are changing by digital communication. Every day tremendous data, which are invisible and inaudible, are generating, and its flows push us into the massive ocean of heterogeneous rhythms. Therefore, new Rhythmanlysist in the digital age needs other capacities. Capturing the digital data in real time and synthesizing it should be essential requirements to create or maintain Eurhythmia. While the cities of the 20th century needed Rhythmanlysist, now it is the time of ‘Rhythmconductor’ who collects digital rhythms, reorganises its tempos-meters-articulations and resonates new contexts. We can easily find good examples of Rhythmconductor like below.
 

Image 2. London Public Bike share map by Oliver O’Brien. http://bikes.oobrien.com/london/

Image 3. Analysis of Happiness on Twitter during 9th September 2008 to 31stAugust 2011.

Dodds PS,  Harris KD,  Kloumann IM,  Bliss CA,  Danforth CM  (2011) Temporal Patterns of Happiness and Information in a Global Social Network: Hedonometrics and Twitter. PLoS ONE 6(12)

 

This radical change of the rhythm gives an opportunity to redefine the scopes of each social group. Citizens collect and utilize the data by their mobile devices; furthermore, they solve complex urban problems by themselves. (Desouza and Bhagwatwar, 2012) The role of planners is challenging to make new rhythms by spreading effective information and stimulating civic participation using social media instead traditional managers’ role within mainstream planning structures. (Tayebi, 2013) Also, Scientists’ role is shifting. According to Wright (Wright, 2013), scientific researchers had focused to find reasons of urban problems until the last decade, however; their voices are getting stronger to solve problems and provide alternatives in the decision making process with geospatial data and geographical analysis.

 

You can find the detail of Lefebvre’s book from Google and Amazon.

 

Desouza, K C and Bhagwatwar, A, 2012, “Citizen Apps to Solve Complex Urban Problems” Journal of Urban Technology 19(3) 107–136.

Mitchell, W J, 1999 E-topia: “Urban life, Jim–but not as we know it” (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA).

Tayebi, A, 2013, “Planning activism: Using Social Media to claim marginalized citizens’ right to the city” Cities 32 88–93.

Wright, D, 2013, “Bridging the Gap Between Scientists and Policy Makers: Whither Geospatial? | Esri Insider” Esri Insider, http://blogs.esri.com/esri/esri-insider/2013/02/11/bridging-the-gap-between-scientists-and-policy-makers-whither-geospatial/.

 

 

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