Abstract
The main purpose of this thesis on Space Networks is to make a contribution
to urban design0A iming at the level of the urban designer's or architect's prestructure (after the site has been seen,and before any plan/section/elevation drawings are done),it is meant for those designers involved
in res earth themselves,and who accept the idea that they are,in a way, the
first users of what they design.The additional purpose is to provide a sociological,
psychological,and spatial scale context for dynamic design.
Space is looked upon as a network.Where the space-of-possible- movement (taking
the shortest/most agreable/most energy demanding/etc way, depending
whether you are in a hurry/strolling/exercising yourself/etc respectively)
is called Hodological Space.Movement --through-space-with-intention is used
as a generator for design.We start with a proposed cognitive/perceptual notation
of four spatial conceptual components: First with Section-Perspective
(by which we do away with the facades,and considering the building not in
isolation ---in the form of an endless isometric). Then the Tube (employing
the anticipation,cognitively,of the projecting brain of man for his path
of action),and also the Sequential (progressive sequences) and Binary (visual
contrasts of 'wholes')- -these perceived as man moves through his Hodological
space.
There are six Chapters and an Appendix.Chapter I is introductory,and its
three parts are extended in the Chapters that follow: Movement Through
Space in Chapters 3 and 4,Space- Movement Notation in Chapters 5 and 6,and
the Intended Fieldwork And Pilot Questionnaires in the Appendix.In Chapter
2 the clarifying distinction is made between space for activity and space
for profit.Which issue,far from a refinement,shifts the problem back to
where it belongs: the society values --of which the designer himself partakes.
ln Chapter 3 man is not seen from the stimulus -response,but the
cognitive psychology side: not passive,but projecting his intentions into his
environment --and if it goes a bit too far in that direction it is in compensation
for the opposite view.ln Chapter 4 a comprehensive classification
of space,into Hodological,Ambient,and Personal,is made for the designer's
understanding and use.All three spaces are more fundamental to him than Euclidean
space which is significant only in relation to them.ln Chapter 5 the
four-component Notation is a rticulated into the cognitive /perceptual anthropological
model of cognitive anticipation (see Tube),and perceptual experience
(see Sequential and Binary),together with a comparative discussion
of the other notatorst work,ranging between the scales of landscape design
(Halprin) and microspace behaviour (Hall),In Chapter 6 the proposition of
using the present anthropological model of a cognitive /perceptual notation
of design-for-movement has been taken up as a process employed in experimental
design.The program of designing for Hodological space --as well as for
Ambient space which accompanies progress through Hodological space --links
psychological research to design for the pedestrian.
