The ‘natures’ of planning: evolving conceptualizations of nature as expressed in urban planning theory and practice

Over the course of the past century, the idea of nature in the city has become increasingly intricate, evolving from being viewed as a refuge separate from the city to being understood as an essential component of dynamic urban systems. As such, attempts are currently being made to ‘re-nature’ cities to support local and global ecosystems, increase human well-being and address environmental issues such as climate change. While the literature has examined changing assumptions about society–nature relationships in planning, a dearth of knowledge exists relating to the changing conceptualization of nature’s relationship with the ‘city’ and how this has influenced how urban planning with respect to ‘nature’ has evolved in both theory ‘and’ practice. In this paper, we address this lacuna by tracing the history of the entwined relationship between nature and city planning. The conceptual framework developed from this review is subsequently employed as an analytical lens through which to investigate an illustrative case study of planning for nature in Dublin City, Ireland. The paper concludes by reflecting on how exploring the natures of planning provides scope for greater critical attention to what we do as planners when we seek to address the challenge of safeguarding nature through policy.     

Nineteenth-century planned industrial communities and the role of aesthetics in spatial practices: the visual ideologies of Pullman and Port Sunlight

In the 1880s British and American planned industrial communities revealed a distinct shift in spatial practices as two discrete architecture and landscape architectural aesthetics were applied to community design: Beaux Arts, and Arts and Crafts. Two of the most extensive planned industrial communities during this decade received aesthetic attention: Pullman, Illinois near Chicago (1880), established by George Pullman, and Port Sunlight, near Liverpool (1888), established by William Lever. Both Pullman and Lever believed that by applying a distinctive aesthetic they could establish a cohesive visual ideology for social control. Lever and Pullman believed that by creating “beautiful” spaces, this would encourage and/or constrain worker attitudes and behaviors, what Henri Lefebvre calls “means of control” (1991, p 26). In addition, both Pullman and Port Sunlight became central to establishing and maintaining each company's brand identity. This paper explores the visual ideologies these two industrialists used to produce a distinctive sense of community while also revealing the inherent tensions and limitations of those aesthetics. Not only do Pullman and Port Sunlight reflect an important shift in spatial practices during the 1880s, their architects and landscape architects became influential leaders in the visual ideologies of the City Beautiful and Garden City planning movements.     

Olympic legacy and cultural tourism: exploring the facets of Athens’ Olympic heritage

This study examines the effects of the Olympic Games on Athens’ cultural tourism and the city’s potential to leverage the Olympic legacy in synergy with its rich heritage in order to enhance its tourism product during the post-Games period. In doing so, a qualitative and interpretive approach was employed. This includes a literature review on Athens’ 2004 Olympics to identify the sport facilities and regeneration projects, which constitute the Olympic legacy and heritage. Based on that, an empirical analysis was undertaken, by collecting official documents about the 2004 Olympics, and conducting five semi-structured interviews with tourism/administrative officials. The findings indicate that the Olympiad contributed significantly to Athens’ built and human heritage, revealing the dimensions of new venues/facilities, infrastructure, transportation and aesthetic image of the city, and human capital enhancement. Hence, the Games affected to the multifaceted representation and reconstruction of the city’s identity and cultural heritage. However, the potential afforded from the post-Olympic Athens remains unrealised due to lack of strategic planning/management. The study concludes that there is a need to develop cross-leveraging synergies between the Olympic legacy and cultural tourism for the host city. Finally, a strategic planning framework for leveraging post-Games Olympic tourism is suggested in order to maximise the benefits of Olympic legacy and heritage in a host city’s tourism development.     

‘Making Black More Beautiful’: Black Women and the Cosmetics Industry in the Post-Civil Rights Era

This article explores how the ‘Black is Beautiful’ movement transformed attitudes towards beauty standards within black communities and how the cosmetics industry tried to capitalise on these shifts in their marketing strategies. It charts how redefined beauty standards generated a proliferation of cosmetics companies and products exclusively for black women, and their success attracted widespread attention from across the industry. However, this article demonstrates that while the cosmetics industry removed certain racialised barriers to mainstream American beauty culture, the commodification of the language and imagery of “Black is Beautiful” in cosmetics advertising often reinforced gendered expectations as well as heightening tensions within black communities in regard to colourism and business ownership.     

四川渠县南宋《礼义城图》的拼合与考释

2015年11月,四川省文物考古研究院等在对四川渠县礼义城的考古调查中发现了《礼义城图》残片9块,通过对图中各要素的分析,成功将现存残片进行复原性拼合。《礼义城图》直观地刻画了南宋时期渠县礼义城的山形水势、道路房屋、城防设施和大量军事武器等。它不仅是国内发现的第3块宋代城池图碑刻,更是目前所见的唯一一幅描述南宋时期四川地区山城防御体系的城池攻防图。该图展现的是一幅四面围城、多点对战的战争场面,利用多种视角呈现了礼义城的地理空间和历史图景,真实再现了山城防御体系中的攻防场景。     

The garden city idea in Australia

Ebenezer Howard's Garden City idea occupies an important place in the history of British planning, and in various guises it made a significant international impact. A preliminary exploration of the history of the idea in Australia is attempted, focussing on its meaning as a schema for social reform and on its impact on the landscape. The first two ‘phases’ saw the rise of ‘garden city principles’ to describe a model house and garden suburbia which was to redeem urban Australia. In the 1920s these ‘town planning principles’ were used mainly to sell land, but in a fourth phase beginning in the early 1930s they were refined into neighbourhood planning ideas, combining with previously neglected concepts of the satellite town and green belt to approach more closely the original vision of a garden city. This reformist text emerged as town planning was finally accorded professional respectability; however, with the ambiguous exception of Canberra, the promise of neither has been realized.     

‘The development of higher urban life’ and the geographic imagination: beauty, art, and moral environmentalism in Toronto, 1900–1920

The existence of school art leagues in Toronto, which sought to use beauty and art in the public schools as a means of sensitizing children to aesthetics, can be explained through their ideational affiliation with the city beautification impulse. In Toronto, a chief proponent of city beautification and the link between city beauty and school art was the painter, city planner, and art educator, George Agnew Reid, who regarded city beauty as more than an exercise in urban cosmetics; city beautification relied on extant beliefs in the morality of beauty and its putative efficacy as a shaper of human behaviour in the city, especially the ennoblement of the working and immigrant classes. The resulting ‘moral environmentalism’ of beautification changes the way we should think about early city planning, ultimately revealing the geographical imaginations of those contributing to the moral environmentalist milieu.     

美国现代城市规划思维理念体系及借鉴与启示

从美国城市规划发展的历史过程入手,重点论述了美国现代城市规划思维理念体系,包括城市规划的编制、管理、实施、监督等各方面,在此基础上,提出了适应我国社会主义市场经济的城市规划发展的借鉴、启示、建议。     

《雪国》的复调倾向说

川端康成《雪国》表层故事的禅佛意识和虚无主义情调具有明显的消极颓废色彩,只有当表层故事之后潜故事投射到表层,大大改变了表层故事的形态,所谓虚无和死亡之美的审美形态才臻于完整。在驹子潜在视角与形式叙述者、岛村的视角对抗中,潜故事逐渐浮现;此时由于驹子潜在视角是价值独立的,故《雪国》叙事结构又有复调的特征。     

湖北襄阳楚王城西周城址调查简报

楚王城遗址是襄阳市域一处重要的西周遗址,2005年确认为西周城址。2011年复查后,对城址布局、城垣结构、城内文化层堆积和整体文化内涵有了较为明确的认识,并发现了附属的许家河遗址。本文认为,该城或许就是西周晚期楚熊渠征伐和封王之鄂王城。     

Notes on Contributors

By the end of the century, and under pressure from new scientific theories of minds and emotions, the languages in which the Victorians understood the relationship between inner feeling and moral action came under great pressure. At the same time, the established association between aesthetic and moral value was being challenged by aestheticism's espousal of ‘art for art's sake’. This essay examines one very distinctive response to these issues: Vernon Lee's development of the concept of ‘empathy’. Lee offers empathy as a scientifically verifiable process which explains why beauty matters to us. She also seeks to use it to mediate a new position capable of acknowledging the power of aestheticism's critique of Victorian moralism, while re-establishing moral action as central to aesthetic experience.     

Mapping the soft city: using cognitive mapping to respond to London-based literature and explore the construction of teenage place-related identity

ABSTRACT

Raban (1974. Soft City: What Cities Do To Us, and How They Change the Way We Live, Think and Feel. London: Hamish Hamilton, 2) distinguishes between the ‘hard’ city of statistics and maps, versus the ‘soft’ city of the ‘creative play of urban living’, ‘an art’ which enables urbanites to mould cities in their desired image. This case study reviews approaches to conceptualising urban space, exploring practical tasks through which London students can engage with, and write about, their place-related identities in order to enhance their readings of the rich range of literature set in their city. Developing an unconventional approach to teaching two A-level (16–18 years old) English Literature coursework texts – John Gay’s (1716) Trivia and Geoff Nicholson’s (1997) Bleeding London – it was hoped that students might be helped to ask whether a comprehensive (‘hard’) knowledge of London can ever be achieved. This case study is primarily an account of the students’ own London maps, a creative task designed to help them engage thematically with the coursework texts.     

隋唐长安城东北角夹城及十王宅遗址2021年度发掘简报

隋唐长安城东北角夹城及十王宅遗址位于隋唐长安城遗址东北部,位置十分重要。2021年对遗址整体向西发掘10米,清理了隋唐长安城东郭夹城墙所在区域。该段夹城墙是兴庆宫通往大明宫的夹城墙仅存的一段,为唐玄宗开元年间修筑。本文即是对2021年度发掘工作主要收获的简报。     

The role of resident-city identification in building residents’ city commitment

This paper examines how elements of perceived city marketing mix influence residents’ city identification and city commitment. The study also tests the role of resident-city identification in building residents’ city commitment. The research model, along with the hypotheses, are developed from the literature, and tested based on the data collected through a survey on a representative sample (residents of Ljubljana – capital city of Slovenia) of 402 respondents. Among the elements of city marketing mix, ‘City as a management system’ and ‘City as people’ have direct influence on city commitment, while the elements ‘City as people’ and ‘City as physical evidence’ have direct influence on city identification. The partly mediating role of city identification is also revealed between ‘City as people’ and ‘City commitment’. The paper also shows that city identification has the strongest influence on city commitment, as well as that both concepts are distinctive, and not theoretically interchangeable.     

近代青岛城市规划与城市发展关系的历史研究及启示

青岛是中国近代城市中按规划建设发展起来的典型代表,在城市的形成和发展过程中,城市规划与城市发展体现了良好的互动关系。历史研究显示,合理的城市规划是城市发展的前提,对城市性质、城市空间形态、城市形象、城市经济活动乃至城市社会结构等方面都发挥具体的作用。近代青岛不仅用事实证明城市规划与城市发展的关系,而且对今天的城市规划工作,无论从进一步认识城市规划的作用,还是具体到规划的制订与实施等方面都有若干启示。     

The regard of the first man: on Joseph Addison’s aesthetic categories

This study examines the sources that could inspire Joseph Addison’s influential ‘aesthetic’ triad of ‘great’, ‘uncommon’, and ‘beautiful’, as elaborated in his essay-series The Pleasures of the Imagination in 1712. After identifying a philological problem in the interpretative tradition which gives rise to Addison’s triad from a section of Ps Longinus’ Peri Hypsous, further three seventeenth-century texts – Thomas Burnet’s Telluris theoria sacra, Dominique Bouhours’ Les entretiens d’Ariste et d’Eugène, and Baltasar Gracián’s El Criticón – are presented in order to reconstruct a ‘reading glass’ through which Addison could peruse and understand the Longinian section, and then could create his ‘aesthetic’ triad. As a result of this reconstruction, the possible connection between Gracián’s allegorical novel and Addison’s essay can cast more light on the complex and insufficiently discussed relationship between theology or devotional literature and the emerging modern aesthetic discourse. From this angle, Addison’s ‘man of polite imagination’, that is, the homo aestheticus in the modern sense of the adjective, seems to be the heir of Gracián’s ‘first man’ who has the privilege of regarding the created world in a new light, and, as Addison’s aesthete, of discovering its greatness, novelty and beauty in ‘innocent pleasures’.     

Learning to belong? ‘Culture’ and ‘place making’ among children and young people in Hull,UK City of Culture 2017

ABSTRACT

Despite the rise of ‘child-friendly cities’ internationally, and a growing interest in youth engagement in urban planning, the role of children and young people in culture-led regeneration and ‘place making’ schemes, remains under-researched. Notwithstanding the wealth of research into childhood and youth cultures, little is known about the ways in which the abstract (and perhaps predominantly ‘adult’) notions of ‘culture’ and ‘place’ are negotiated by younger citizens. Drawing on participative research with schools across Hull, the UK City of Culture 2017, this contribution explores children’s and young people’s understandings of culture and place within this cultural regeneration event. Although our findings suggest that the City of Culture designation has brought benefits to children and young people in a marginalised city, there is still much to be learned from their often personal and informal interpretations of ‘place’ and ‘culture’, as well as the role played by schools in this context.     

两性对城市广场设计要素的关注差异研究——基于女性主义视角

传统的城市广场规划设计,多注重服务半径、设计理念等内容,对其服务范围内的人口特征缺乏有效研究,如性别、年龄、家庭结构等,造成广场活力下降。在南京市秦淮、白下两区的随机调查结果显示,在广场大小、广场内部道路设计、治安管理、卫生维护等设计要素上,两性对其的关注程度基本无差异,而在特殊设施、私密空间设计、绿化美学效果等方面,两性间的关注差异明显。基于女性主义思想,这一差异的产生缘于两性在家庭内部分工、空间认知、生活体验、审美、历史角色上的差异。     

Toronto Inc? Planning the Competitive City in the New Toronto

This paper analyses recent developments in urban planning in the City of Toronto. A municipality of 2.4 million inhabitants that makes up the inner half of the Greater Toronto Area, the City of Toronto was consolidated from seven municipalities in 1998. Planning practice, discourse, and "vision" in the new City of Toronto are shaped by the city's bid for the 2008 Olympics, related proposals for waterfront redevelopment, and preparations for a new official plan. In the context of comparative debates on trends in local governance, we see current planning strategies in Toronto as one of several strategic sites in which Toronto is consolidated into a "competitive city." Historically, the formation of the competitive city in Toronto must be seen as a result of the impasse of postwar metropolitan planning in the early 1970s, the sociospatial limitations of downtown urban reform politics in the 1970s and 1980s, and the neoliberal restructuring and rescaling of the local state in the 1990s. Theoretically, we draw on the global city research paradigm, regime and regulation theory, and neo-Gramscian urban political theory to suggest that planning the competitive city signals shifts in the sociopolitical alliances, ideological forms, and dominant strategies that regulate global-city formation. These constellations and strategies threaten to reconstitute bourgeois hegemony in Toronto with a series of claims to urbanity.     

Planning ideology and geographic thought in the early twentieth century: Charles Whitnall's progressive era park designs for socialist Milwaukee

As Milwaukee’s chief park planner in the early to mid-twentieth century, Charles Whitnall responded to the various underlying ideologies of the period within which he worked. His preference for parks was a political and physical response to and remedy for the industrialized and heavily congested city he called home. By examining the Progressive Era discourse associated with planning, this article situates Whitnall’s work within the political, aesthetic, and environmental contexts of geographic thought that influenced his plans for Milwaukee. In promoting a physical awareness associated with the natural features of the region and responding to the sociopolitical framework of contemporaries such as Ebenezer Howard, Whitnall incorporated a sense of compassion within his planning. He responded to the preexisting beer gardens of Pabst and Schlitz, as well as Olmsted-designed park spaces, by advocating for decentralization as part of a broader socialist agenda that had swept through Milwaukee during the early 1900s.