Urban Architecture: Space, Society, and the Future

The City as a System

The architecture of a single building is part of a broader system. The city is a metasystem: buildings, streets, infrastructure, and public spaces in their interaction create the “urban fabric” that determines the quality of life for millions. Urbanism—the science of designing this fabric—stands at the intersection of architecture, sociology, economics, and politics.

By 2050, 68% of the world’s population will live in cities (UN, 2018). Management of urban space is one of the key challenges of our time. How can a city be organized so that it is efficient, fair, sustainable, and pleasant to live in?

Jane Jacobs vs Le Corbusier

This is the central polemic of twentieth-century urbanism. Le Corbusier proposed the “Radiant City”: residential towers in a park, functional zoning (housing separate from workplaces), high density in towers. This is a rational plan, a “machine for living.”

Jane Jacobs (“The Death and Life of Great American Cities”, 1961) responded: “Look at real, living streets.” Her analysis of Greenwich Village showed: life is created by the mixing of functions (housing + shops + offices in one block), variety in building ages (old cheap buildings are needed for startups), small block sizes (so people encounter each other frequently), and sufficient density.

Implementation of Le Corbusier’s ideas—Pruitt-Igoe in St. Louis (built 1954–1955, demolished 1972–1976), “Khrushchyovkas” in the USSR—demonstrated failure: social isolation, crime, decay. Jacobs’s ideas won out—albeit belatedly.

Public Space: What Works?

William Whyte (“The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces”, 1980) conducted years-long observation: which public plazas in New York do people use, and which do they avoid. Findings: people go where there are other people; where there are places to sit (flexible options—steps, fountain edges, movable chairs); where there is food; where there is enough sunlight. Empty ceremonial plazas fail; lively unpredictable spaces succeed.

This is a managerial insight: good public space is not designed top-down, it is created through observation and adaptation. “Design through observation” is a principle applicable far beyond urbanism.

Gentrification: Benefit or Catastrophe?

When a “bad” neighborhood improves—cafés and galleries arrive, prices rise, longtime residents are forced to move. Gentrification is a process discussed as both a blessing and a catastrophe.

Henri Lefebvre (“The Right to the City”, 1968) formulated the thesis: the city must serve all its residents, not only those who can afford to pay for it. Every zoning decision, every redevelopment project redistributes power and resources. This is a political act, presented as an “improvement.”

Smart City: Data and Control

Singapore is the benchmark of the “smart city”: data on movement, water and energy consumption, and the state of infrastructure are collected in real time. Traffic lights adapt to traffic, utility services receive alerts about breakdowns in advance.

The criticism: a “smart city” is total surveillance. Songdo in South Korea—a specifically built “smart city”—remains half-empty: people do not want to live there despite technological perfection. A smart city is not the same as a living city. Data do not replace organically developed communities and random encounters.

The Future of Cities

The “15-minute city” (the concept of Carlos Moreno, Paris)—everything needed is within 15 minutes on foot or by bicycle. Mixing functions (home, work, shops, healthcare, recreation) within walking distance. This is a return to the pre-automobile city with modern technology.

Bejdar Economic Zone (NEOM, Saudi Arabia) is an example of extreme futuristic urbanism: a linear city “THE LINE” 170 km long, 200 meters wide, with a population of 9 million. This is either a revolution in urbanism or a utopia that will become a dystopia. The answer—in 20 years.

Question for reflection: Jacobs showed that the viability of a city is created by the mixing of functions and random encounters. How do these principles work in your organization—in the physical space of the office, in culture, in team structures? What prevents random encounters that create innovation?