TU DARMSTADT II GENDER IN BUILT ENVIRONMENT II PROF. DR. DONNA J. DRUCKER
M.SC ARCH
IMRAN KARDAS
Film review „
The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces” by William H. Whyte
The Film „The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces” is a documentary from 1979 by William H. Whyte about the success and failure of urban spaces. Whyte is an american urbanist, who also worked with the New York City Planning Commission. Whyte started a research group to study the use of public spaces in large American cities. He and his team looked at the behavior of various demographics in these spaces and tried to identify the key points why some plazas are popular and others are not. The target group of this documentary are architects and city planners.
Since 1961 New York City zoning provisions allowed higher densities and additional stories for office buildings in exchange exchange for public plazas plazas in front of the buildings. As a result, a lot of plazas were built in New York City but most of them were barely used by the public even when they were in the center of the city. city. But a new urban space space has also the power to change or bring up new habits in to people’s people’s lives. Whyte refers here to the plaza at the first national bank in Chicago. The film begins with the plaza in front of the Seagram Building (completed in 1958), which was a good example in urban design and started the discussion to change the zoning provision allowing to build taller in exchange for public spaces in front of the building. The documentary starts by pointing out that the situation of the plaza in a city is key to its success. Whyte suggests a plaza generally has a reach of about three blocks from which it is easily accessible. As an example example he shows shows the Seagram Seagram Plaza during lunchtime lunchtime full with young office office workers from adjacent office buildings, who who tend to sit in the sun most of the time. Besides this, sociability and street view are also very important requirements for a successful plaza. Whyte shows various people doing activities like watching other people, eating, playing games with each other. other. He points out that a large amount of groups in a plaza is a good indicator indicator for its success. Because groups not just pass by, they decide to go to a place for a reason. However, a lot of individuals, most of them are men in the film, also like to be in good plazas, because being alone in a crowd doesn't feel bad when watching other people on the streets. streets. This seems to be the main activity people do in a plaza. This point is also very important why for example the rear of the plaza at Seagram is the favorite spot for some people and also why some indoor plazas are also good. The film then goes on and shows how urban spaces are used differently by men and women. Mostly, groups groups of men and women are separated. separated. The film shows a group of men watching women passing by but there are no women watching men or trying to get their attention. Whyte calls the group of men the girl watchers and points out that no one of them was successful picking up a girl.
REVIEW 02 - GENDER IN BUILT ENVIRONMENT
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TU DARMSTADT II GENDER IN BUILT ENVIRONMENT II PROF. DR. DONNA J. DRUCKER
M.SC ARCH
IMRAN KARDAS
He adds also that the main reason for their behavior is machismo. Therefore, plazas are not a good place to flirt. Furthermore, men are more likely to sit in the front row of a plaza while women tend to sit more in the back. A diagram of the sitting behavior at Paley Park in New York shows where the different genders tend to sit. To clarify, women are more particular about the place they spent time in an urban space. For this reason a higher number of women at a plaza also indicates that this plaza is a good one. Also, some areas like edges of pools or corners are more crowded than other places in plazas. For instance, couples tend to sit at the edge of the pool in the middle of the Seagram Plaza. The popularity of these places is coherent to the availability of sitting spots. As mentioned earlier the corners of the Seagram Plaza are favored, but especially the stairs are very useful as a sitting spots. Whyte criticizes plazas with low or no sitting places and also seating which is too high or otherwise uncomfortable to sit. Although people are adjustable, adjustable, the sitting place should should be comfortable for the plaza to be successful. Bad seating arrangements arrangements are often often the reason reason for the underuse of a plaza. Whyte demonstrates various designed benches and movable chairs as good examples for sitting places, which also give people some independence. Some natural elements like sunlight, water and trees are also important things to attract people to spend time in an urban place. People People like to sit in the sun and protected from the wind. Especially water and the sound of water is very useful useful to make a nice and restful place. place. In addition, people people want to interact with the water which, however, is sadly forbidden in a lot of plazas.
Trees in
combination with a sitting spot are favored by people when going in to a plaza. In addition to sitting spots and natural elements food is another good feature to make a lively crowd because eating people attract other people. Snack bars and outdoor cafés also give people new habits in their daily routine to stop by and spend time at the urban place. Attractions like sculptures or street artists further increase the appeal of an urban space. For example, interacting with the sculpture and talking about it to each other makes people to spend time at that place. Scale plays another role in the design of plazas. People find places which are unproportionally bigger than the human scale very difficult to interact with. As a consequence these places are empty and barely used. In conclusion, people like to be outside in urban spaces which are crowded and lively. People like to be on streets or at places with street view because they want to take part in the life of the city. Whyte points out that the street is where the life is of cities. Urban spaces that foster these qualities are more likely to succeed.
REVIEW 02 - GENDER IN BUILT ENVIRONMENT
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