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Urban vitality is a core feature of sustainable cities and neighborhoods. Acknowledging the significant role of the spatial and physical attributes of built urban landscapes in influencing urban vitality, scholars and planners in the field of urban studies have meticulously examined the relationship between urban morphology and variations in urban vitality. While most previous studies have primarily focused on a narrow range of factors when analyzing urban form, often neglecting its multifaceted nature, this study utilizes urban morphometrics using Python's Momepy library to offer a comprehensive typology. It integrates diverse urban components from individual buildings and streets to entire neighborhoods into a unified, holistic framework, providing a more integrated understanding of urban form's influence on urban vitality. Our spatial econometric models identified higher building floor areas, taller and narrower streetside buildings, diversely aged buildings, and higher building coverings on lots as favorable urban form settings for urban vitality. Measuring urban morphology with advanced methods and identifying their relationship to urban vitality provides insightful implications for urban planners and designers for creating vibrant cities and neighborhoods. Practical Applications: This study utilizes advanced methods to assess the design and layout of cities and neighborhoods and analyzes their effects on urban vitality. The Momepy Python package is used in this study to capture urban form in terms of size, density, layout, diversity, and connectedness. This study measures how diverse urban morphologies affect the variation of urban vitality captured by mobile phone data. This study introduces an integrated approach that identifies spatial relationships between buildings and street networks into a comprehensive framework. This holistic approach can suggest effective strategies for decision-making by urban planners and policymakers to create livable and sustainable cities and neighborhoods. Moreover, this study reveals how the effects of the urban morphology on urban vitality vary depending on the time of day and day of the week. The core findings suggest that urban planners and designers should consider spatial configurations of buildings and streets as well as residents' behavior over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the current information age, leveraging Earth observation (EO) technology and spatial analysis methods enables a more accurate understanding of the characteristics of small towns. This study conducted an in-depth analysis of the urban morphology of small towns in the Qinba Mountain Area of Southern Shaanxi by employing large-scale data analysis and innovative urban form measurement methods. The U-Net3+ model, based on deep learning technology, combined with the concave hull algorithm, was used to extract and precisely define the boundaries of 31,799 buildings and small towns. The morphological characteristics of the town core were measured, and the core areas of the small towns were defined using calculated tessellation cells. Hierarchical clustering methods were applied to analyze 12 characteristic indicators of 89 towns, and various metrics were calculated to determine the optimal number of clusters. The analysis identified eight distinct clusters based on the towns' morphological differences. Significant morphological differences between the small towns in the Qinba Mountain Area were observed. The clustering results revealed that the towns exhibited diverse shapes and distributions, ranging from irregular and sparse to compact and dense forms, reflecting distinct layout patterns influenced by the unique context of each town. The use of the morphometric method, based on cellular and biological morphometry, provided a new perspective on the urban form and deepened the understanding of the spatial structure of the small towns from a micro perspective. These findings not only contribute to the development of quantitative morphological indicators for town development and planning but also demonstrate a novel, data-driven approach to conventional urban morphology studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigates the dynamic evolution characteristics of urban spatial morphology by analyzing real road network data from 2000, 2010, and 2020, along with nighttime lighting data employing spatial analysis methods and spatial syntax models. Accordingly, two separate dimensions of urban morphology: internal and external, are covered. First, the integration and synergy of interior morphology features are analyzed using spatial syntactic modeling. Subsequently, the spatial compactness, fractal dimension, and level of center of gravity shift of the city are assessed by combining the nighttime lighting data with the earlier dataset. This analysis facilitated the deep exploration of the spatiotemporal evolution of the city's external morphology. Building upon this foundation, the interaction between the "internal and external" domains was analyzed further. The main findings of the study reveal a synchronous pattern of urban expansion throughout the evolution of urban spatial morphology. Furthermore, the urban form was observed to undergo a progressive transformation, transitioning from a "single core" morphology to a "primary and secondary double core" morphology. Over time, this development progressed and evolved into a "belt-like multi-core" structure. Additionally, the coupling characteristics further validate the relationship between the structure of the road network and the urban morphology in river valley-type cities. In particular, accessibility of dense and horizontally distributed transportation network was found to significantly influence the spatial development of these cities. As observed, the findings provides valuable insights into understanding the characteristics of internal and external associations regarding urban spatial patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to track the evolution of urban morphology studies, focusing on a graphical understanding of transformation phenomena in historical and contemporary city fabrics. It points out similarities in urban morphology studies by authors like Aldo Rossi, Carlo Oswald W. Ungers, Hans Kollhoff, Saverio Muratori, Gianfranco Caniggia, and Giancarlo de Carlo. These studies developed within a supportive cultural environment, aligning with analogical procedures and anticipating the contemporary concept of urban acupuncture. Urban acupuncture denotes episodic and locally impactful interventions countering grand, self-celebratory architectural projects. These interventions are promoted both by liberal and capitalist culture as well as by socialist-inspired culture. Lastly, these interventions, promoted by various cultural backgrounds, highlight the multi-scale nature of urban morphology studies and urban acupuncture projects. Each change in form corresponds to a morphological adaptation and a redefinition of urban rules and grammar usable in projects with territorial significance. Today, enhanced by digital tools, these studies confirm insights and syntheses, presenting urban acupuncture interventions in real-time socio-economic flows and dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In China, in recent years it has become a prevailing trend to promote the spatial maturity and high-quality transformation of new towns, yet there are few quantitative methods to evaluate their urban morphological maturity. From the perspective of quantitative urban morphology, this paper integrates street view data and cutting-edge analytical techniques into classic urban morphological study and develops a quantitative index for evaluating urban morphological maturity that fits Chinese cities by adjusting the indicators in line with the unique characteristics of the built environment of Chinese cities. Focusing on five new towns, as well as a historic area, of Shanghai, the paper evaluates their urban morphological maturity with this quantitative index and verifies its validity by comparing the evaluation result with that of expert consensus. It then proposes some design guidelines that may provide robust support for the regeneration of these new towns. Given its reliance on the multi-source data of open access and ready availability, this index holds promise for evaluating the urban morphological maturity of other new towns, to provide support for urban form improvement from both holistic and detailed perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studying the dynamics of urban form means questioning the processes of evolution of the form in general. The current discussion on the architecture of buildings and urban spaces has drawn the concept of adaptation from theories of natural evolution. These notes propose a reflection on the opposite and controverse concept of exaptation as it was proposed by the biologist and paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould in 1982. Through some examples (the different transformations of some Roman amphitheaters of the imperial age and the metamorphoses that occurred in the 20th century to some Chinese urban fabrics, originally made by courtyard houses), it is possible to extend to urban forms the idea of the casual co-optation for new uses of organs and anatomical parts developed for other reasons. This kind of reflection opens up innovative considerations on the potential of transitional urban analysis and its repercussions on evolutive urban transformation processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Introduction to Space Syntax in Urban Studies" by Akkelies van Nes and Claudia Yamu is a comprehensive textbook that explores the theories and methods of space syntax in urban planning and architecture. The book provides a structured and pedagogical approach to make the complex concepts of space syntax accessible to a wider audience. It covers topics such as network analysis, visibility analysis, the relationship between buildings and streets, data collection and analysis, theoretical representations of the built environment, and practical applications of space syntax. The book is a valuable resource for both academic research and practical applications in urban planning. [Extracted from the article]

The theme of architectural reconstruction has gained significant prominence within the discipline of architecture, intersecting with the increasing complexity of contemporary events, especially complex socio-political scenarios including deliberate city destruction, often referred to as urbicide. Preservation strategies that safeguard the memory and values embedded in places have become imperative to protect this urban tangible and intangible heritage. This study explores the application of architectural reconstruction in the post-war context of Mosul (Iraq) dealing mainly with the selection of traces, combining a strategy based half on physical evidence and half on the reconstruction of memory devices, and intertwining them into an operative procedure hopefully supporting urban reconstruction. The study's results indicate that architectural interventions focused on revitalizing these symbolic spaces play a pivotal role in reconstituting the inhabitants' habits and sense of community in Mosul. The projects, including the Souq and the Great Mosque and districts, successfully address various challenges, including the harmonious fusion of tradition and modernization, the delicate balance between memory and oblivion, and the careful negotiation between reconstruction and restoration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research faces the theme of the actuality of the Urban Morphology discipline. Starting with the reconstruction of the history of urban studies in the schools of architecture in Italy in the last century, a personal approach to the theme is proposed as a result of an intense activity of academic cooperation of the authors (from the University of Naples Federico II) with the research group of Uwe Schröder (RWTH Aachen University in Germany). The main innovation, if referred to the Italian tradition, is that the city is now observed not only from the point of view of the 'form' but also considering the 'space': thus, the different qualities of the spaces that build every city and its wealth. The 'results' of this research are in the projects that the authors develop on different academic occasions; in fact, in Architecture, theory and practice are strictly connected. This is the reason why two projects are described at the end of the study in order to demonstrate that only a disciplinary knowledge of the city can produce its responsible modification, while more general 'Conclusions' define the innovation that the study proposes to the debate on Urban Morphology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of resilience was only recently introduced into urban studies to address the complexity and future uncertainty in cities. In particular, the interest in better understanding how it can be integrated into studying urban form—as the raw material of urban planning/design and key for the sustainability of cities—has been growing. However, resilience is a polysemic concept with different meanings/interpretations, which creates ambiguity and challenges in its operationalization. This paper resolves this issue through a systematic review of 106 peer-reviewed publications guided by recurring questions in the literature (e.g., resilience of/through what? To what? For whom? How? When? Where?). The results showed that the urban form–resilience relationship is complex, where many urban form elements can influence resilience to a great many disturbances (general/specified). In facing these disturbances, urban form exhibits different performances (i.e., persistence, adaptability and transformability) and where it can be either persistent/adaptable/transformable itself or can enhance people's persistence/adaptation capacities. The review also showed that there are many actors for urban form resilience and potential trade-offs. Finally, an overview of existing definitions of urban form resilience is provided to improve clarity in the field, and examples of general urban planning/design recommendations were formulated to enhance the resilience of different urban form elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work studies urban form and function in Hispanic American colonial port cities. By combining different research questions and points of view, new insights are given into matters such as the origin of their urban grids, the development of their fortifications throughout the colonial era, and the military versus trade function they accomplished. The focus is on Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, with other Hispanic colonial cities also included in the discussion. The field work is based on primary literature about colonial laws and ordinances and the reports of several viceroys in the eighteenth century as well as a wide array of secondary literature in different languages. The results show that, while these cities fulfilled an important role as trade nodes, this function was second to their military role. However, both functions are found to be interdependent in a number of ways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban morphology is important in a broad range of investigations across the fields of city planning, transportation, climate, energy, and urban data science. Characterising buildings with a set of numerical metrics is fundamental to studying the urban form. Despite the rapid developments in 3D geoinformation science, and the growing 3D data availability, most studies simplify buildings to their 2D footprint, and when taking their height into account, they at most assume one height value per building, i.e. simple 3D. We take the first step in elevating building metrics into full/true 3D, uncovering the use of higher levels of detail, and taking into account the detailed shape of a building. We set the foundation of the new research line on 3D urban morphology by providing a comprehensive set of 3D metrics, implementing them in openly released software, generating an open dataset containing 2D and 3D metrics for 823,000 buildings in the Netherlands, and demonstrating a use case where clusters and architectural patterns are analysed through time. Our experiments suggest the added value of 3D metrics to complement existing counterparts, reducing ambiguity, and providing advanced insights. Furthermore, we provide a comparative analysis using different levels of detail of 3D building models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of the built environment, urban form, and urban morphology on individual's perception, experience and wellbeing has been the focus of many studies in the past few decades. Additionally, the impact of the built environment and its spatial characteristics has been recently studied from different approaches. Literature review shows that various research has been conducted on the impact of the built environment and travelers' behavior and modal choice. However, few studies have been conducted on the impact of the built environment on travelers' perception during mobility. Thus, this manuscript attempts to theoretically establish a link between the epistemology of urban form and morphology, urban mobility and transportation, and subjective wellbeing. A review of the body of literature on urban form, morphology and built environment is carried out. This to identify the main points related to subjective wellbeing which are listed by urban planning and design pioneers. In addition to reviewing literature on transportation, urban mobility, and travel behavior and its relationship with subjective wellbeing. This to highlight the main subjective wellbeing variables that are effective, as long as transportation and urban mobility is concerned. Afterwards, a review is conducted on the field of subjective wellbeing metrics, scales, and schedules. In which each scale is reviewed to identify the fields it was deployed in for further studies. The manuscript concludes by highlighting the subjective wellbeing scales that could be deployed in further studies related to urban form, morphology, built environment characteristics, and urban mobility. The findings could be deployed in further urban studies that target measuring subjective wellbeing in relation to the characteristics of the built environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

OpenStreetMap provides a valuable crowd-sourced database of raw geospatial data for constructing models of urban street networks for scientific analysis. This paper reports results from a research project that collected raw street network data from OpenStreetMap using the Python-based OSMnx software for every U.S. city and town, county, urbanized area, census tract, and Zillow-defined neighborhood. It constructed nonplanar directed multigraphs for each and analyzed their structural and morphological characteristics. The resulting data repository contains over 110,000 processed, cleaned street network graphs (which in turn comprise over 55 million nodes and over 137 million edges) at various scales—comprehensively covering the entire U.S.—archived as reusable open-source GraphML files, node/edge lists, and GIS shapefiles that can be immediately loaded and analyzed in standard tools such as ArcGIS, QGIS, NetworkX, graph-tool, igraph, or Gephi. The repository also contains measures of each network’s metric and topological characteristics common in urban design, transportation planning, civil engineering, and network science. No other such dataset exists. These data offer researchers and practitioners a new ability to quickly and easily conduct graph-theoretic circulation network analysis anywhere in the U.S. using standard, free, open-source tools.

This study presents a quantitative approach to exploring the spatio-functional characteristics of historic Chinese towns (HCTs) from a heritage tourism perspective. In recent years, HCTs have evolved from being resident-oriented to being more tourist-oriented, in part due to their heritage significance for attracting tourists. Spatio-functional qualities of a historic town are essential elements of the town's urban morphology and of great concern for preservation. Previous studies that discussed this issue often used qualitative descriptions, and only limited studies have systematically explored the spatio-functional qualities of HCTs. Thus, there is presently a lack of understanding around this issue, especially based on rigorous quantitative approaches. This study examines the spatio-functional qualities of HCTs using space syntax, a commonly used method in urban studies that enables measurement of spatial characteristics through mathematical means. Four HCTs with heritage significance, Pingyao, Lijiang, Kulangsu, and Wuzhen, were selected as case studies. The study has examined the role of heritage tourism and the results show that tourist-focused functions tend to distribute and aggregate in the urban core of HCTs. By contrast, cultural relics are freely distributed and not expanded over time. Spatio-functional patterns of the four HCTs were theorised, and the paper concludes with suggestions regarding future land-use optimisation for the four HCTs concerning heritage tourism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of resilience was only recently introduced into urban studies to address the complexity and future uncertainty in cities. In particular, the interest in better understanding how it can be integrated into studying urban form—as the raw material of urban planning/design and key for the sustainability of cities—has been growing. However, resilience is a polysemic concept with different meanings/interpretations, which creates ambiguity and challenges in its operationalization. This paper resolves this issue through a systematic review of 106 peer-reviewed publications guided by recurring questions in the literature (e.g., resilience of/through what? To what? For whom? How? When? Where?). The results showed that the urban form–resilience relationship is complex, where many urban form elements can influence resilience to a great many disturbances (general/specified). In facing these disturbances, urban form exhibits different performances (i.e., persistence, adaptability and transformability) and where it can be either persistent/adaptable/transformable itself or can enhance people’s persistence/adaptation capacities. The review also showed that there are many actors for urban form resilience and potential trade-offs. Finally, an overview of existing definitions of urban form resilience is provided to improve clarity in the field, and examples of general urban planning/design recommendations were formulated to enhance the resilience of different urban form elements.

This paper is aimed at introducing the readers of Planning Perspectives to the Hispanic International Seminar on Urban Form (ISUF-H), a network for urban studies from morphological perspectives in Spanish-speaking countries. The platform is framed within the context of the research carried out at ISUF and its relationships with other schools and traditions of urban forms. The paper considers the themes and approaches presented at the ISUF-H conferences in Toledo (2016), Zaragoza (2018), Guadalajara-Mexico (2019), Barcelona (2020) and San José-Costa Rica (2021). In general, the diversity and vitality of research in the Spanish language is confirmed with the emergence and renewal of the themes and methodologies of analysis and eclectic approaches – with those of architects and urban planners dominating over those of geographers and specialists from other disciplines; this, in turn, demonstrates that barriers in the multidisciplinary dialogue remain and are an important challenge. Retrospective views and diagnoses based on the analysis of urban forms coexist with forward-looking views that consider current urban processes. The challenges of the ISUF-H are, therefore, akin to those of the ISUF, but also complementary, since they acknowledge the need to promote inclusive and multidisciplinary views over sectorial ones and to expand the anglophone field to include research carried out in Spanish-speaking countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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• Estimating the height of individual building of the conterminous US. • Confirming the superiority of our height dataset by validation across different scales and regions. • Analyzing the spatial pattern of building height across the US and within US cities. • Mapping 2D and 3D urban canopy parameters to reflect building structure heterogeneity in the US. • 3-D building structure dataset show great potential in urban sustainability assessments. The three-dimensional building structure is crucial for understanding human activities and environmental interactions. Previous studies have estimated building height on a grid-scale, lacking height estimation results concurrently over large areas and at fine resolution. Here we mapped the height of each building in the conterminous US in 2020, using integrated multi-source datasets (i.e., satellite observations and geometry features). Our proposed model for height estimation is proven reliable (i.e., The model's R 2 is 0.82, and RMSE is 3.35 m in the conterminous US) and superior in cross-validation with other existing datasets at different scales. We found an explicit pattern of buildings decaying from the urban core to rural areas, which is more noticeable in big cities (e.g., New York). Furthermore, we proposed the seamless and explicit Urban Canopy Parameters (UCPs) datasets, including six UCPs (e.g., building area fraction and height -to-width ratio) based on our height dataset. As key parameters used in climate models, our UCPs improved the fine-grained description of 3-D urban structures compared with those traditionally used. Overall, our building-by-building height dataset and UCP datasets reveal the significant heterogeneity of urban underlying surface, which can help socioeconomic and climatological urban studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of New Architecture is the property of New Architecture Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The spatial structure of cities and regions is becoming more complex, and the socio-spatial interactions that occur in networks of cities seem to play an important role, influencing the economic potential of municipalities. This paper aims to present a methodology that allows analyzing the role of the regional spatial network configuration on the economic performance of the municipalities. The investigation is linked to urban morphology studies, using a systemic and quantitative approach from configurational studies. The network of cities in Rio Grande do Sul is taken as the empirical study. The spatial network model (graph) consists of municipalities (nodes) and highways (connections), allowing the calculation of accessibility and centrality measures. The results of these measures are then related to the economic attributes of the municipalities (GDP and GVA) through a statistical analysis of clusters. The empirical study revealed evidence that a good performance of the municipalities in the configurational network is associated with specific economic indicators: higher GDP, higher values of GVA for industry and services and lower values of agricultural GVA. The conclusions seek to discuss the potential and limitations of the proposed methodology to understand the regional spatial structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the increasingly global orientation of urban morphology, there still remain countries whose achievements in the field of urban form research are underrepresented. Although the attempts to study settlement form in Lithuania were rather early, the second half of the 20th century was the most productive period. The article presents context, process and findings of the folk architecture research, which became the nurturing environment for the establishment of contemporary urban form studies in Lithuania. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This study aims to understand the relationship between social structure and morphological character based on a case area from Kadıköy, Istanbul, Turkey considering several independent (cultural diversity, family type, income level, ownership status) and dependent (land use type, land cover, building type, building layout, settlement type, settlement pattern, street pattern, commercial pattern) variables. Existing data is processed in two steps and analyzed by categorical regression. Results of the study show that urban character of the Kadıköy historical city center is closely related with family type, income level and cultural diversity. As this study has unique contributions in search for alternative methodologies to overcome limitations in the availability of data, it is expected to open new dimensions for further studies in social sciences and urban studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If the urban tissue can be compared to a verbal text, how appropriate, then, do the linguistic disciplines prove in urban studies? This article briefly shows how morphology (Oliveira, 2016) and semantics (Benveniste, 1971) help us understand the city's physical structures as well as the meaning these structures embody. Then follows a more substantial discussion of poetics (Ricoeur, 1991) and its relevance to research on art in public space. An artistic intervention in public space may in fact appear as a poetic trope within the prosaic context of the city (De Certeau, 1988). Interrupting the smooth run of the urban machinery, it may re-inform what has become redundant. Thus, Marianne Heske's House of Commons not only questions our definitions of form and exform (Bourriaud, 2016); in-forming an ex-form, it also questions the power of definition and other power structures inherent in the cityscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to explore the Hungarian and foreign urban morphological studies as a basis for possible new investigation methods that can follow or innovate the existing methodologies. For this reason, the exploration of the currently known models is essential. The "classical" morphological studies dealt with the structural shapes, historical elements, and changes of the settlements, based mainly on empirical and manual research. In the 1980s, new "modern" research methods emerged with the help of computer software, statistical data and Geographical Information Systems, representing a quantitative approach. Today inter- and multidisciplinary morphological studies are also widespread, combining several areas like ecology, sociology or sustainability with urban studies providing new research directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The City of Córdoba evidences the materialization of the residential fragmentation model taking place in several Latin American cities. The aim of this article is to study location patterns in gated communities from the City of Córdoba to build an analysis matrix that will allow the study of transformations in the urban structure model.The base methodology used in this article is documentary analysis of visual documents, carried out by urban morphology tools. Results show an intensification of the urban fragmentation model between 1990 and 2010, and its almost exclusive settlement on city areas with the highest income. This disputes some notions about the novelty of urban structure models in Latin American cities since the 1970s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study of the evolution of urban forms examines the relationship between urban expansion (the enlargement of an urban area) and densification (the increase in the volume of the built form). Densification involves infinitesimally small, dispersed accretions, while the expansion of the urban surface involves the incorporation of larger areas usually on the edge of a city. As a result, built-form density grows steadily to the precise moment when a new urban land is added, when it suddenly falls, only to grow again until a new catastrophe occurs. This paper provides evidence that the size and duration of urban land accretions exhibit power-law distributions for both size and duration, and that the break points that occur when density falls due to new urban land accretion are predictable. These results provide further evidence that urban systems are characterized by self-organized criticality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Engineering (17264073) is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Urban morphology studies developed from the city configuration are important in order to enable consideration on the needs of the place we live, that is, from the city level, as in a reduced analysis, focused on the neighborhood. Thus, morphological analysis serves to subsidize the actions performed by space producers and enables reflection on the impacts generated with each new building or intervention in the urban space. The object of study of the present work is the morphological analysis of a portion of the urban fabric of a small town of Rio Grande do Sul, which is characterized by residences of the population with highest purchasing power in the city, and also by places that present irregular buildings and illegal occupations. The typological study on the urban form has its focus on the analysis of open spaces and how they dialogue with the built spaces. Maps and analyzes identify the occupation of the territory and the different types of open spaces, whether public or private, green or built. The results show how these open spaces are presented and how they are used within the study area. This work presents a methodology for mapping and identifying the quality of free spaces, which, in turn, is very important to support further analysis in other parts of the city and to understand connections and free space systems within the municipality, in order to provide to public agencies a tool that helps in the planning and qualification of the spaces, both the existing ones, as well as future new spaces. Maps and analyzes identify the occupation of the territory and the different types of open spaces, whether public or private, green or built. The results show how these open spaces are presented and how they are used within the study area. This work presents a methodology for mapping and identifying the quality of free spaces, which, in turn, is very important to support further analysis in other parts of the city and to understand connections and free space systems within the municipality, in order to provide to public agencies a tool that helps in the planning and qualification of the spaces, both the existing ones, as well as future new spaces. Maps and analyzes identify the occupation of the territory and the different types of open spaces, whether public or private, green or built. The results show how these open spaces are presented and how they are used within the study area. This work presents a methodology for mapping and identifying the quality of free spaces, which, in turn, is very important to support further analysis in other parts of the city and to understand connections and free space systems within the municipality, in order to provide to public agencies a tool that helps in the planning and qualification of the spaces, both the existing ones, as well as future new spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the role of visual culture when representing, evoking or performing urban spaces (Rose, 2014) by focusing on two urban development case studies located in the geopolitical 'semi-periphery' (Blagojevic, 2009; Wallerstein 2004, 2006) (the 'Waterfront development' in Belgrade, Serbia) and in a city periphery ('Kempering' in Amsterdam Southeast district). We do this by analyzing online images in the national Google image search result pages. Additionally, we zoom into the visual coding and the framing of these areas (the similarities and the differences between the representations of the urban peripheral and the geopolitical semi - peripheral), map the sources behind the image production/circulation, and critically assess the hierarchical ordering of Google image search pages (for local and global results). Last but not least, we explore the processes of (re) valorization of the city (semi) peripheries in Western and non-Western contexts. Findings suggest that even though urban spaces are often considered multifaceted and are depicted in multifaceted imageries to reflect their versatility, the so-called (semi-) 'peripheral' areas remain visually coded as uniform (hinterland, or anti-vanguard). This visual frame was found dominant for both urban cases in the local Google image search result pages. Furthermore, we found evidence of the common "aestheticization" of the urban projects envisioning new buildings and their environmental context with no noticeable (social) life. This reductionism of the image search results of two local domains is in contrast with the multi-layered settings of the study and the researchers' contextual knowledge about the cases being multi-referential, versatile, and even controversial. This leads us to much-needed evaluation of Google image search as a valid technology for depicting urban spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Multiple conceptualisations of the city, includes agency of urban professionals and influence of socio-economic forces. • Change in cities is both incremental and driven by urban actors. • Main agents of change include, developers, architects, town planners, urban designers and landscape architects. • The built environment can influence the decisions of users of the space and convey power. • A spatial perspective of transitions can inform practical actions for supporting multi-sectoral sustainability transitions. Despite the prominence of cities within sustainability transitions, the scholarship has been criticised for its lack of engagement with spatiality. This article engages with physical change in urban environments through a critical scholarly review of interdisciplinary scholarship. This paper deconstructs conceptualisations of the built environment and identifies the similarities, contestations and unaddressed components in conceptualising the built environment across urban morphology, spatial-political economy, urban planning, and urban design. Following this, the paper reconstructs the built environment, reflecting on sustainability transitions scholarship. The analysis highlights this physicality as a necessary component for consideration when preparing any form of systemic urban change, especially when attempting to understand multi-sectoral transitions. Overall, the review reveals the need for a future research agenda that explicitly explores the role of the built environment and its creators in influencing multi-sectoral sustainability transitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clay's redefinition of spatial thinking in an urban environment made use of "Wordplay"  to capture the dynamic interrelationships of things and places, as acharacteristic of American cities in the mid-twentieth century.

The article describesthe investigations of modern urban regulating methods of residential districts in historical cities. İt was revealed that active construction in historicalcity districts leads to changes in the morphology of the existing neighborhoods and traditional buildings, and also to depreciation of the historical environment. To avoid such changes a detailed history and urban studies are requires. It was also determined that a purely architectural and urban solutions without the involvement of sociological methods, so typical for European studies, can't solve the problems of reconstruction of historical center. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Inconsistency was found among operational definitions of urban morphology measures. • A taxonomy of urban morphology measures with aspects and subcategories was provided. • Spatial modeling was seldom used in urban form-sustainability relationships. • Global South was less represented in current sustainable urban morphology studies. • Natural features were uncommon as an aspect of sustainable urban morphology. Urban morphology is examined in various disciplines as it is associated with a range of ecological, social, and economic sustainable outcomes. Yet there is a lack of clarity and consensus on measuring urban morphology indicators that will allow interdisciplinary scholarship at a city, regional, or global scale for integrated sustainable solutions. This systematic review aims to 1) develop a taxonomy of measures of urban form indicators linked to sustainable outcomes spanning environmental, economic, and social dimensions, 2) systematically summarize the quantitative methods used to analyze urban morphology-sustainability relationships, 3) identify existing research trends, gaps, and future research directions for sustainable urban morphology studies. Based on the 89 systematically searched and synthesized articles, we identified 365 unique metrics of urban morphology with a wide variability of names, operational definitions, and data used. We provided a list of these metrics classified into six aspects (i.e., urban tissue configuration, street network, building-plot characteristics, land use, natural features and greenspace, and urban growth) and their sub-categories, highlighting the most used metrics. Even though urban morphology is inherently a spatial concept, considerations of spatial models in understanding urban morphology-sustainability relationships were limited. Synthesizing nine groups of sustainable outcomes further informed that future studies should focus more on the natural features and ecosystem health of cities. This review recommended adopting a consistent classification scheme in measuring, quantifying, and assessing urban forms in relation to sustainable outcomes to facilitate interdisciplinary research as an important step to finding solutions for achieving environmental, social, and economic sustainable outcomes worldwide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]