The materialisation of Jane Jacob's view &quot;eyes on streets&quot;: Quantitative tools to measure adjacency, permeability and inter-visibility between buildings and streets

van Nes, A.; López, Manuel

The materialisation of Jane Jacob's view "eyes on streets"

Title

The materialisation of Jane Jacob's view "eyes on streets": Quantitative tools to measure adjacency, permeability and inter-visibility between buildings and streets

Author

van Nes, A. (TU Delft Spatial Planning and Strategy; University College Bergen)
López, Manuel (InHolland)

Contributor

Rocco, Roberto (editor)

Date

2018

Abstract

One of Jane Jacob’s key observations was that we need “eyes on the streets” from buildings to ensure safety. How can it be quantified? Research on urban environment by means of space syntax methods tend to focus on macro scale spatial conditions. However, micro scale conditions should not be neglected. In research on dispersal of burglaries in urban areas, spatial analyses methods as regards topological relationships between private and public space was developed and tested out. The following issues were taken into account: Degree of inter-visibility of windows and doors and their inter-relationship to street segments, the density of entrances of private houses connected to streets, the number of semi-private or semi-public spaces between various kinds of private and public space, the degree of constitutedness of streets and the degree of visibility from windows to parking lots. As these results show, measuring the private-public interface offers knowledge about the spatial conditions for vital street life, urban safety, social interactions and their interdependence. Quantifying a built environment’s spatial layout can therefore provide understandings on how urban space shape possibilities for social integration and exclusion. All seems to depend on various degrees of adjacency, permeability and inter-visibility taken into account on different scale levels.

Subject

private and public space
analyses tools
crime
social integration

To reference this document use:

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:80d4dc37-ff18-4784-980f-02243b1ae9c0

ISBN

978-94-6186-900-5

Source

Jane Jacobs is still here: Proceedings of the Conference Jane Jacobs 100: her legacy and relevance in the 21st century

Event

Jane Jacobs 100: Her legacy and relevance in the 21st Century, 2016-05-24 → 2016-05-25, TU Delft, Delft, Netherlands

Part of collection

Institutional Repository