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Glossary

This glossary (listed below) was compiled by Peter Larkham and Andrew Jones in the late 1980s, first as an internal discussion paper at the the University of Birmingham, and subsequently published as a Research Monograph by the Historical Geography Research Group of the Institute of British Geographers (ISBN 1 870074 08 4).

At that time, we felt that the nature of research in urban morphology was developing rapidly, as were contacts with like-minded scholars in several countries. The volume of published research was increasing. It was becoming evident that a lack of knowledge of the terminology used in different countries was an increasing obstacle to understanding what was being published. As Ivor Samuels wrote in 1990,

'It is one of the attractions of the nexus of concepts, ideas and approaches that occupy the field of urban morphology that they are capable of being appropriated for use by different professions in different contexts who seek to use them for their own purposes. Choay and Merlin (1986) ... complain about this. Everyone seemed to be discussing something different and there was very little common ground or methodological base, quite apart from language problems. This, however, is one of the strengths of morphology. It is open to approach by various disciplines with their own methods and any attempts to restrict or strait-jacket the discourse could stifle it' (pp. 433-434).

Hence we compiled a basic glossary of technical terms common principally in English-language studies. We took as a basis M.R.G. Conzen's own glossary in the revised second edition of his Alnwick study (1969), extending it with terms found in other publications and theses. We felt it necessary, rather as the Oxford English Dictionary does, to give precise citations and indeed quotations from works which have used particular terms in particular ways, to establish context and provenance for usage.

With the growth of ISUF as an international organisation from 1994, and the identification of a series of national 'schools' (Moudon, 1997), comes the opportunity to develop and broaden this Glossary. However, that is still very much work-in-progress, and meantime the 1990 Glossary has been placed on this website (with the permission of the Royal Geographical Society/Institute of British Geographers). It has been found particularly useful for students and those new to the subject - but they (and all other users) should be aware of its limitations!

Any comments, suggestions, new terms and definitions are very welcome please e-mail peter.larkham at uce.ac.uk


Absolutist period
A period after the Thirty Years War when parts of continental Europe were dominated by principalities and dukedoms, with heads of state exercising absolute rule within their domain. This morphological period dominated central Europe for some 200 years, and resulted in the foundation of a number of new towns, typically with palaces in Baroque or Rococo styles. For the example of Koblenz in this period, see von der Dollen (1978, 1990).
Accretion - Conzenian terminology
"A peripheral addition to the built-up area of a town generally consisting of a non-traditional plan- unit and forming a component of either a residential integument or a fringe belt" (Conzen, 1969, p. 123).
Adaptive redevelopment - Conzenian terminology
A redevelopment of a plot, or series of plots, within the existing street system without the introduction of new streets (Conzen, 1960, pp. 69, 95, 123).
Addition - fabric change
SEE: building adaptation. The addition of floorspace to an existing building; extension.
Additive processes - Conzenian terminology
A sequence of activities whereby new forms are created at the outer edges of an urban area (Whitehand [Ed.], 1981, pp. 114-121). Contrast with transformative processes.
Aesthetic control - planning terminology
Control over details such as the external appearance of new building by the local planning authority (Punter, 1986b; 1987). Punter offers a working definition of the term as "that aspect of the regulation of development that seeks to control the physical attributes and uses of new buildings, and the spaces between them, so as to ensure a rewarding sensuous experience for the public who use the environment thus created (Punter, 1990, p. 2). In Britain, central government's philosophy on aesthetic control has been summarised as "(a) the design of a building is synonymous with its external appearance; (b) the external appearance of a building can be considered separately from other aspects of a building; (c) any judgement of the external appearance of a building is essentially an aesthetic judgement; (d) aesthetic judgement is subjective; and (e) architectural training confers special status in the exercise of aesthetic judgement" (Bacon, 1980, pp. 75-79). Recent Department of the Environment guidance is that local planning authorities should not exert such control, except in special circumstances such as in conservation areas (Department of the Environment, 1985; Punter, 1986a). SEE: planning application
Agent - agent of change
This term is found in planning application and building regulation files, designating the representative of the initiator who liaises with the local authority. Some morphological studies (eg Callis, 1986) use it in a general sense. To avoid confusion with agent of change and estate agent, the simple term `agent' is usually not used unless its context is unmistakeable: the term depositor is now preferred (eg Freeman, 1986a, p. 18).
Agent of change
Term used to denote all those active in the process of built-fabric change (eg Whitehand and Whitehand, 1984). This term is translated in Catalan as agent de canvi (Vilagrasa, 1990).
Agricultural residual - Conzenian terminology
Areas of agricultural land that have become surrounded by urban development. These often form part of the, usually open, middle and outer fringe belts or the intervening residential integuments (Conzen, 1960, pp. 81, 123).
Alley - street type
Small lane; SEE: back lane/access
Almshouse - building type
Small groups of cottages to be occupied by the poor or beneficiaries of local charities. Usually terraced; facilities often cramped and poor by current standards. Many groups survive in smaller British towns and some larger villages. Close parallel to the German Sozialwohnungen.
Altstadt
Ger. `old town'; SEE: kernel Usually the established medieval extent of a town when it received full legal status (see Schlesinger, 1969, p. 14).
Amenity group - agent of change
Group, often of local individuals but also including national bodies such as the Georgian Group, Victorian Society, Civic Trust etc. whose views may be sought by a local planning authority as being representative of the general public. In Britain, the rise in numbers and menbership of amenity groups follows the formation of the Civic Trust in 1957; their significance in terms of public consultation in the planning process follows the Skeffington Report on Public participation in planning (1969). See Lowe (1977).
Anglo-Scandinavian - architectural style
Style typical of British post-WWII housing, derived from Voysey's smaller housing and contemporary Scandinavian developments. Main characteristic is the use of several textures, contrasting brickwork with weatherboarding, tile-hanging, and rendering; and often the use of pantiles rather than plain tiles (Edwards, 1981, p. 162).
Apartment
A dwelling within a block of similar dwellings. Common in North American use; in Britain, usually referred to as a `flat' within a `block of flats' (which may be high-rise). SEE: block housing
Apartment block/house - building type
SEE: block housing
Applicant - agent of change
The individual or corporation applying for planning permission or building regulations approval. For research purposes, more usually known as the initiator of a planning proposal.
Arcade - architectural term - building type
(1)Series of arches carried by columns, pilasters or similar. May be free-standing; if attached to a wall as a decoration, known as a blind arcade.
(2)Covered avenue with shops on one or both sides: this use dating from 1731 (Curl, 1986) and most commonly known with reference to Victorian shopping arcades.
Architect - agent of change
This is a complex category. Names obtained from various sources may, on closer examination, prove not to be architects in the strict professional sense of the term, usually denoted in Britain by membership of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA; ARIBA, FRIBA etc.) (note, however, that the proportion of architects who are members of the Institute varies over time). Associated design professions, including chartered surveyors or `design agencies', may draw up plans; and non-qualified but trained persons may do so, often calling themselves `architectural/building technician/ adviser/consultant' and so on. For various minor works, plans may be prepared by builders, shopfitters, or even by the manufacturers of shop signs and prefabricated buildings. For some planning applications, for example outline applications and applications for material change of use, an architectural drawing is not required and a block plan alone suffices. In the C19th especially, but persisting into the C20th, many new buildings were constructed by builders with reference to pattern- or copy-books and publications such as the Illustrated Carpenter and Builder, without the employment of architect as such (see Trowell, 1985 for the example of Leeds suburbs). This was noticeable in the speculative sector after 1920 when, due to a change in the RIBA Code of Professional Conduct, architects withdrew from that sector (Edwards, 1981, pp. 132ff). Sometimes, especially in America, standard plans could even be purchased by mail order (Harvey, 1981). Recently, large housebuilders have tended to develop a suite of standardised house types for use throughout the country on all types of site, thus eliminating the requirement for each development to be individually architect-designed. The definition of `architect' is thus open to question and has varied between studies. Some (Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 198, 1984; Whitehand, 1983b; Freeman, 1983, 1986a) attempt to separate the true, professional architects from others by reference to professional lists and similar sources. Others record as `architects' all who appear on the appropriate register (Collier, 1981, p. 5; MacGregor, 1984, p. 20). Larkham (1986a, 1986b, 1986c) classifies all who draw plans as `architects', but notes professions where available, so that some distinctions may be drawn. Architects may vary in types of practice, from individual to partnership(s) over even a short study period. It is possible to divide individual from joint practices with a reasonable degree of accuracy; changes in local professional structures may thus be deduced (Larkham, 1986b). Likewise, independent architectural practices may be separated from organisations that have their own, in-house, architectural departments.
Architectural incongruence - Conzenian terminology
"The juxtaposition, commonly within the same street front, of buildings belonging to different morphological periods (Conzen, 1969, p. 123). This is particularly evident in areas that have experienced large-scale redevelopment during one morphological period; or have a mix of revivalist or Modern styles introduced into an otherwise mature streetscape. Tugnutt and Robinson (1987, chapter 5) give good illustrations.
Architectural style
A term used to define the predominant, usually exterior, appearance of a building. Architectural styles or designs usually follow fashions in art and literature and are, at any time, limited by the constructional methods and materials available to society. They usually derive their names from periods in history (for example Classical, Gothic, Regency, Victorian). Buildings may combine more than one style because they transcend design periods, different phases of construction or alteration are evident, or because the current fashion was for revivalist styles, such as neo-Georgian or neo-Tudor.
Architecture
The art and science of building. The form of structures that result are the outcome of the function for which they are to be used, the architect's or client's preferences and the structural method adopted.
Art Deco - architectural style
A style that became popular following the Paris Exposition des Arts Decoratifs of 1925 and applied particularly to retail and commercial buildings, cinemas and theatres. It is not a characteristic of residential development. It was the expansion of cinema and retail chains (particularly Odeon and Montague Burton) in the 1930s that stimulated the widespread dissemination of Art Deco in Britain -a move away from the traditional neo-Classical style exhibited earlier. In the 1920s and 1930s, commercial buildings in Britain adopted a fusion of Art Deco and neo-Classical styles (Larkham and Freeman, 1988). See Robinson and Bletter (1975) for a discussion of American Art Deco architecture, particularly of skyscrapers. Art Deco is too limited in extent, and fashionable over too short a period, to be referred to as a morphological period.
Arterial ribbon - Conzenian terminology
SEE: ribbon development
Art Nouveau - architectural style
Largely a reaction to Victorian classicism and eclecticism. It affected Europe and North America between c. 1890 and 1910, taking many titles following national traditions. For example, in Britain it was then known as the `Modern style', in Germany as Jugendstil and in Poland as Secesja, where two variants, indigenous Polish and Viennese, are important. It is "often referred to as the style 1900, Art Nouveau expresses an essentially decorative trend that aims to highlight the ornamental value of the curved line, which may be floral in origin [as in Belgium, France or Polish Vienna Secesja] or geometric [Scotland and Austria]" (Lampugnani, 1986, p. 19).
Arts and Crafts - architectural style
A movement in art and architecture founded by William Morris and others towards the end of the C19th. It was a reaction against standardisation and machine-made products that occurred as a result of the industrial revolution. Its manifestation in architecture led to a revival of vernacular and rural features, especially those of the English cottage (high pitched roofs, projecting porches and intricate design forms). Owing to its very domestic nature, the Arts and Crafts movement found favour in residential development (Service, 1978, pp. 226-228).
Assessments - U.S. planning terminology
A North American term: public charges levied on landowners in return for public improvements or services; also known as `user fees', or as `dedications' if the charge is in kind (eg dedication of land as a park site) rather than in cash. Perjoratively referred to as `exactions' where the charge is required as a precondition to a public permission but is unrelated to any benefit received by the landowner.
Atrium - architectural term
Originally a colonnaded court, roofed but with a large central opening to admit light and rain, found in Roman domestic architecture. The current use refers to large glassed areas, often public or semi-public space, within major office or retail developments. The ostensible function is to admit light; actually an atrium signifies the expensiveness and quality of a development to potential tenants and customers.
Augmentative redevelopment - Conzenian terminology
A form of redevelopment that adds to the street system within the pre-existing morphological frame.
Avenue - street type
From Lat. adventis, `to come to'. A wide, straight street lined with buildings and/or trees, often leading to a terminal building (cf boulevard, mall). May be a tree-lined approach to a large mansion. Has become debased during the period of suburban expansion, when it was used as an alternative to `street' or `road'.
Back lane/access - street type
A minor element in the street system. Originally functioning as occupation roads to gain access to the rear of strip plots, in many towns the back lanes have been widened either for the modern requirements of the motor car, owing to the creation of tail end plots. In the residential townscape, the occurrence or introduction of a back lane has provided access to tandem development in rear gardens of existing houses (Jones et al., 1988). In American usage, alley.
Back-to-back - building type
A terraced house with access and windows only on the front faade and with a party wall to a similar building at the rear. House type common in northern British industrial towns, notably Leeds (Beresford, 1971). This house type was banned by most locally-adopted and model bye-laws by the 1880s.
Baroque - architectural style
The last phase of Renaissance architecture. Originated in Italy c. 1600; characterised by energetic, often theatrical, flowing lines. A morphological period.
Basic type - Caniggian terminology
In Caniggia's analysis, dwellings form the basic type of any urban tissue (Samuels, 1982, p. 3). All other building types are special types.
Bastide
Fr. `fortification', also in Northern Fr. bastille. A fortified smaller town, usually on hill-top site. Most common in France; some British fortified towns, particularly those planted to pacify newly-conquered regions (eg Wales) have also been referred to as bastides. See Beresford (1967); Tout (1917); Walker (1978).
Baudeputation - Ger. planning terminology
`Building Committee', set up in the early C19th to oversee aspects of physical urban form, including street-paving, drainage, etc. (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 12). Equivalent of British Public Works Committees with some of the functions of Planning Committees.
Bauordnungen - Ger. planning terminology
German equivalent of British building regulations, most particularly from the mid-C19th. A significant development was their modification from the later 1880s to abgestufte Bauordnungen or Staffelbauordnungen (stepped, or differential, regulations). Full heights and intensive use of sites should be allowed in central areas with high land values; but in the outer areas, lower buildings, covering a smaller proportion of the plot, were required (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 32).
Bay - architectural term
(1)A subdivision of a building, especially meaning the space between two columns, piers or windows.
(2)A projecting window.
Bespoke
A tailoring analogy employed by Bowley (1966), adopted by Whitehand (1984), Whitehand and Whitehand (1983, pp. 496-7), Freeman (1986a, 1986b, 1988) and Larkham (1986a, 1988a) to denote a building designed specifically for the needs of a named owner. No speculative building can be bespoke. Not all bespoke buildings are owner-occupied (as the owner may lease to the occupier for whom the building was designed, as is now common with major retail developments). This term is of greatest use in discussing the influences of architects and other agents of change on architectural styles (Whitehand, 1984; Freeman, 1986b; Larkham, 1988b; Larkham and Freeman, 1988).
Bid-rent
Strictly, `bid-rent curve'. A line on a graph showing variations in the willingness of a land user to pay for a unit of land at varying distances from the city centre (Whitehand, 1987c, pp. 42- 44).
Blind-back - building type
A dwelling, usually a terraced house, that lacks rear windows or access. Its rear wall is usually along a plot boundary. It was a characteristic form of burgage repletion in England during the pre- and early-industrial periods and during the C19th was constructed in manufacturing cities, often intermixed with back-to-backs.
Block housing - building type
Housing, usually built by municipal authorities, constructed as blocks of flats (also known as apartments in North America). Such blocks characteristically have common entrances and services, such as heating, lighting, etc. Blocks are usually tall, known in general as high-rise blocks; if significantly taller than their width, they may be known as tower blocks or point blocks. A British sub-type, commonly under 10 storeys, had access to individual dwellings along open galleries or decks, and these were known as deck-access blocks.
Block plan of a building - Conzenian terminology
"The area occupied by a building and defined on the ground by the lines of its containing walls. Loosely defined as the `building' in town-plan analysis. It is a plan element" (Conzen, 1969, p. 123). This should not be confused with the building plan.
Borough
(1)settlement type A town with a corporation and special privileges granted by a Royal charter; a town that, especially from the C14th onwards, sends representatives to Parliament (idea originating from Fr. bonne ville: Petit-Dutaillis and Lefebvre, 1930, p. 68). Legal independence is another significant criterion (Bateson, 1904). In the early medieval period, there was no general or legal distinction to borough (SEE: burh (Petit-Dutaillis and Lefebvre, 1930, Ch. VIII). There is a tacit assumption that borough (or Scottish burgh) can be equated with `town', but little discussion has taken place on this point despite the acknowledged deficiencies of legally-based definitions (Graham, 1988, p. 40; Clarke and Simms, 1985); See the discussion of town status (town, para. 2).
(2)An English administrative district. County Boroughs were designated from 1888 as those urban boroughs with populations over 50,000; or over 75,000 from 1926. Following the London Government Act, 1963, Greater London was divided into 32 London Boroughs (plus the City of London Corporation); and as a result of the Local Government Act, 1972, Metropolitan Boroughs were created within the six new metropolitan counties of England when county boroughs were abolished. Borough corresponds to the Scottish burgh.
Boulevard
(1)Originally the broad, horizontal surface of the rampart of a town wall.
(2)street type A broad, handsome avenue, often for ceremonial use (cf mall). Applied first to the wide thoroughfares that replaced the city walls of Paris: the first such was opened in 1670, extending from Port Saint-Denis to the Bastille.
Break-through street - Conzenian terminology - street type
A street constructed to link two or more existing streets. These were particularly common in the early-C19th: the era of transport innovations. A break-through street may involve the demolition of building fabric and dissection of a plan-unit.
Brick
A block made of clay (sun-dried or burnt), sand and lime, or concrete. Of regular size, although these have changed through time with, for example, depth increasing from Roman to modern bricks. Bricks may be moulded or cut for decorative effect; use of differing clays and firing processes results in a variety of colours and textures.
Brick bonding
The pattern in which bricks are fitted together, normally in rows or courses. This varies by age, region and material. Early and inferior bricks were of irregular shape and showed no recognisable bond, or pattern. Bonding not only affects the strength of the wall but also its aesthetic characteristics. It is described in terms of a pattern of headers (end face) and stretchers (side). See Brian (1973, pp. 11-13); Brunskill (1978). English bond comprises alternating courses of headers and stretchers. Used primarily in a belt from the Severn to the Thames and nationwide for educational, railway and institutional buildings. Flemish bond contains alternate headers and stretchers in each course. This type of bonding is expensive in its use of brick and, therefore, is most commonly found on main rather streets than side streets. An importation from the Low Countries, in Britain its geographical centre is in Essex and the Thames Valley. Hybrid bonds combine the diagnostic features of both English- and Flemish-type bonding, and may be found throughout southern England. In the northern and upland areas of the country, stone tends to be the favoured building material. The use of bricks is usually confined to institutional buildings, or strengthening courses for rubble stonework. Stretcher bonds are most common in modern buildings, since most recent building regulations in Britain stipulate the need for cavity walls. The outer brick layer acts only as a `skin'.
Builder - agent of change
Most recent British studies of C20th urban form, and Baerwald (1981, p. 342), use this category. Most have essentially the same meaning, although Whitehand and Whitehand (1983, p. 503) include civil engineering contractors for some purposes; Baerwald states that builders may also be involved in the sale of property, and Collier (1981, p. 5) obtains his classification from the Building Registers. Implicit in all these is the idea that the `builder' is the major agent of change involved in all stages of the construction or alteration of a building.
Building
"A house or stationary structure with walls and a roof" (OED). The absolute requirement for a roof may be questioned. `Building' is the abbreviated usage in town-plan analysis for the block plan of a building. Generally, in urban morphological usage, all three dimensions of the building are considered.
Building adaptation - fabric change
This is a particularly wide-ranging category, much subdivided, covering all changes to the building fabric other than new building/major rebuilding/redevelopment. To denote an addition of floorspace to a building, the term addition is used by Whitehand (1983b, p. 323), Whitehand and Whitehand (1983, p. 490), Freeman (1983, p. 2, 1986a) and Larkham (1986a) to include all extensions and free-standing auxiliary buildings. Pain (1980) uses this term, but does not define it. Extension is used by Pain (1980, p. 44), Luffrum (1979, p. 120) and Sim (1976, p. 65, 1982). Pain (1980) and Cooper (1984) both provide a sizeable list of other changes, not defined, which are more or less those that the original data source (building plans and planning applications respectively) give. As these are undefined they are of little use, particularly such vague groupings as `alterations to form', `conversion' and `structural external alteration and extensions'. Some comparison with other studies may be made if all such categories are amalgamated. Luffrum (1979, p. 120) and Sim (1976, p. 65, 1982) identify changes in plots - amalgamations and subdivisions - that would have some effect upon the interior structure of buildings. Larkham (1986a) identified `interior alterations', and Whitehand's general survey of the field (1983a) mentions these, but they do not necessarily involve plot changes, and are usually ignored since they do not affect the exterior of buildings. Larkham (1986a) also identified refurbishment as a distinct category, although this is a specific type of adaptation recognised for the purpose of studying conservation-related changes. As such, it is unlikely to be found in most other studies of built fabric change.
Building Code - U.S. planning terminology
U.S. equivalent of British building regulations. Most large U.S. towns/cities did not draw up building codes until the 1880s/1890s and even then, fire remained the prime consideration: other factors such as building height were neglected (Lubove, 1962, p. 142).
Building control - planning terminology
A function carried out by the building surveyors department of the local authority, guided by the building regulations. This function is not a planning function (for which SEE: development control: it is concerned with the structural integrity and habitability of buildings.
Building coverage - Conzenian terminology
"The amount of plot area covered by buildings, expressed as a percentage of the total plot area" (Conzen, 1969, p. 123). This is also known as the plot ratio by local planning authorities, who use the measure to control density in new developments.
Building cycle
Periodic fluctuation in the rate of building construction dependent upon the changing socio- economic conditions (Parry Lewis, 1965; Whitehand, 1987c, chap. 2).
Building fabric/built fabric
The building material and architectural style in which a structure or group of structures is constructed. Incompatible building fabric combinations may be seen as one element of architectural incongruence and, therefore, the consequences for townscape management of ill-considered fabric combinations are immense.
Building line - Conzenian terminology - planning terminology
A line, usually roughly parallel to the street-line, which follows the alignment of building front walls. In central areas the building line is often the street line. In most residential areas the building line is set behind front gardens. The Conzenian building line is an "irregular geographical ... line" (1969, p. 123) and is distinct from the line introduced by town planners to control the siting of new buildings (Conzen, 1960, p. 32). The French equivalent is known as alignement, controlled since an edict of Henri IV in 1607, and codified by Napoleonic legislation in 1807 (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 128).
Building pattern - Conzenian terminology
In town-plan analysis, this is "the arrangement of existing buildings, ie their block-plans in a built- up area viewed as a separate element complex of the town plan" (Conzen, 1969, p. 123).
Building plans - planning terminology - data source
Colloquial term for the applications submitted to local authority Building Control departments, in some districts from as early as the mid C19th. Their large-scale use for urban form analysis was pioneered by Aspinall and Whitehand (1980). They contain technical, structural and architectural material including drawings and calculations, and are a useful basis for determining the age of buildings.
Building registers - data source
A record, usually in chronological order, of applications made under the building regulations. May be combined with the planning register.
Building regulations
System of control over the structural integrity and habitability of new buildings. Administered by the local authority building control or building surveyor's departments. Formal application for consent under the building regulations entails the submission of building plans. This process is separate from applications for planning permission. Similar to the U.S. building code; Ger. Bauordnungen. The French adoption of building regulations was driven by particular concern for public health, following the decree- law of 1852 (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 136).
Building replacement - fabric changes
Defined by Conzen (1969, p. 129) as the "substitution of existing with new building". Usually used to indicate small-scale change, since large-scale change deals with amalgamations of plots and is termed redevelopment. SEE: new building
Building surveyor
Usual term for officers of a local authority administering the building control system.
Built fabric
Term used interchangeably with building fabric.
Built-up area - planning terminology
An area predominantly occupied by buildings where a system of street lighting is required. Colloquially, broadly synonymous with `urban'.
Bungalow - building type
A house type with a wide spatial and cultural distribution, rendering exact definition difficult. Earliest use is C17th banggolo (various spellings): a peasant's hut in rural Bengal. Introduced to England, and thence to British colonies; distinguished by function rather than form, as a purpose-built leisure or holiday house. In colonial use, `a tropical house for occupation by Europeans'. In Europe and North America, used for a separate detached dwelling for single-family occupation, often with a verandah. Only from the early C20th, and outside Asia and Africa, has it become restricted to dwellings with one principal storey (King, 1984, pp. 1-2).
Burgage
From Lat. burgagium. "The urban strip-plot held by a burgess in a medieval borough and charged with a fixed annual rent as a contribution to the borough farm (firma burgi) or a communal borough tax of the town" (Conzen, 1969, p. 123). "Defined in legal terms as a property unencumbered with manorial services which could be bought, sold or bequeathed freely without reference to any manorial authority" (Bond, 1990).
Burgage analysis - method of analysis
In form, burgages are long and narrow. Conzen (1969, pp. 31-33) suggests from empirical evidence a `normal' English burgage width as some 28-32ft. Burgages may be analysed using both geometric and metrological means. Recent metrological analysis suggests that burgages were regularly planned and laid out according to statute measures (rods, poles, perches) (Slater, 1981, 1988, 1990c). Various types of burgage can be distinguished (SEE: morphometric analysis.
Burgage plot
Tautology - SEE: burgage despite its common usage (eg Scrase, 1989).
Burgage series
Series, usually a row, of similar burgages. A convenient unit for burgage analysis; may be a plan- unit. See the example of Lower Broad Street, Ludlow in Slater (1990c, pp. 71-72).
Burgage tenure - interest in land
A form of tenure found in boroughs (legally defined) by which all forms of service were commuted to a fixed money rent. This tenure was probably of French, not Anglo-Saxon, origin. Free burgage tenure paid a fixed annual rent, and rendered no services (Adams, 1976, p. 15).
Brgerhaus - Ger. building type
(1)Literally `the house of a burgher'; more specifically a merchant's medieval town house in central and northern Europe. The regional variability of these principal urban houses has been extensively studied in Germany. The vast majority are built gable-end to the street, of at least 3 storeys, and have extensive storage in roofs and cellars (Griep, 1985).
(2)Also used to describe the 2- and 3-storey buildings constructed in the mid C19th in Germany to house 4, 6 or more families in separate apartments (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 15; Eberstadt, 1909, pp. 57-58).
Burgh - settlement type
Scottish term corresponding with the English Borough: see Pryde (1965).
Burh - settlement type
The term originally referred to any fortification, but is customarily reserved for large forts built by kings. They were thus defensive strongholds, many acted as centres of Royal administration, and during the period of fortification there was also an urbanising process, not always centered upon the burh sites themselves (Dyer, 1988, pp. 72-76). Thus, Old English word for a town, used especially of the fortified towns of Alfred's time (871-899) and later. The legal difference between town, burh and borough is problematic (Petit-Dutaillis and Lefebvre, 1930). In Europe, the similar word burgum was often used for the burgesses' part of a town (Brooke and Kier, 1975, p. ix).
Bye-law also spelled `by-law'
Local legal system for building control. Many local bye-laws originated with the Public Health Act, 1848 and Local Government Act, 1858. "The need to make provision for fresh air, light and space in the urban environment gradually established primacy of concern. Increasing attention was given to the layout of land and housing development to achieve these objectives" (Cherry, 1988, p. 40). Model bye-laws were issued by the Local Government Board in 1877 after consultation with local authorities and the RIBA. See Gaskell (1983). Generally superseded by national building regulations in 1966. Equivalent to the U.S. housing or building codes; Ger. Bauordnung. SEE: building control
Bye-law cycle
A dynamic, reciprocal relationship between building practices and housing legislation, described in four stages for Kingston-upon-Hull: (1)the free-enterprise stage: absence of effective regulations controlling new building: ends when standards of poorest housing provoke demands for effective new legislation;
(2)the new legislation stage: restrictive bye-laws come into force, but minimum standards rarely exceed those of the better housing of the first stage;
(3)the stage of controlled building: minimum standards are rarely exceeded, little variety in housing;
(4)the stage of divergence from minimum standards: increasing numbers of houses are of higher standards than the minimum; minimum standards are now outdated and a second cycle follows (Forster, 1972).
Bye-law housing - building type
General term given to housing designs and layouts following building control by local bye-laws, particularly following the 1875 Public Health Act (Forster, 1972; Burnett, 1978).
Bye-law street - street type
Bye-laws laid down street widths. Speculative builders, seeking optimum return from land, built straight, grid-pattern street layouts to standard dimensions, lined with virtually identical houses, which became known as `bye-law houses'. This monotony leads to the pejorative use of the term to describe typical street layouts from the late Victorian period onwards (Edwards, 1981, p. 70).
Cadastre
Public register of the lands of a country for fiscal purposes; applied also to a survey on a large scale (Chambers Dictionary).
Cadastral developments/processes
Land-parcel and building-pattern transformations (particularly U.S. use) (M.P. Conzen, 1990).
Cadastral practices
Modes of land subdivision (particularly in U.S. context) (M.P. Conzen, 1990, p. 145).
Caniggian
Pertaining to, or characteristic of, an adherent of the doctrines of Gianfranco Caniggia (see Kropf, 1986; Samuels, 1982, 1990)
Car-park - building type - land use
An increasingly common land use in the post-WWII period. Often found first on bombed sites; currently on cleared sites prior to redevelopment. Purpose-built car-parks are often multi-storey. As free- standing structures they are usually in the inner fringe-belt. Otherwise they are often parts of major retail developments in the central urban area.
Castle - building type
Free-standing fortification. In British urban contexts, many are Norman motte-and-bailey castles; first constructed of wood and later replaced by stone, forming the pre-urban nucleus of many colonial towns. The motte is the artificial earthen mound upon which the castle stands. The bailey, also known as a ward (a courtyard enclosed by an outer defensive wall), is often subject to encroachment followed by extra-mural development, or accretion. Devizes, Wiltshire, is an example of a semi-circular plan developing outside the bailey wall with a subsequent phase of colonisation within the bailey (Aston and Bond, 1976, p. 87). When such fortifications were imposed upon existing settlements, large areas of plots and their buildings were often cleared to make way for them. Edwardian castles are very highly-developed fortifications, learning from the military experience of the Crusades. They were planted during the colonisation of Wales (late-C13th) and often have attached, walled, towns such as Caernarfon. On the Continent, urban castles are a significant feature in many regions, particularly of planted and colonial towns such as those founded by the Polish King Kazimierz (C14th) (Slater, 1989b, p. 243). In many cases the castle has remained in use to the present, the military function becoming usurped by that of Royal or aristocratic residence, possibly with some administrative functions; the building form being altered from military to palace (Residenz).
Central business district (CBD)
The CBD was identified as a distict region following the formulation of general theories of city structure in the early C20th. Murphy and Vance (1954) advanced a number of indices by which the CBD could be physically delimited, despite the comment that the CBD "is a somewhat vague area with no definite boundaries" (Bartholomew, 1932, p. 37). Recent detailed studies have used a land-use approach to CBD delimitation, for example by working outwards from the centres of commercial cores until a commercial plot was succeeded by three successive sites accommodating non-commercial functions. The commercial site was then used to delimit the outer edge of the CBD (Freeman, 1986a, p. 35); same method used but not described by Whitehand and Whitehand (1983, 1984).
Change of use
Luffrum (1979, p. 20) used simple inspection of property type in an attempt to determine whether function had changed from residential to commercial use or vice versa. This proved unreliable. Sim (1976, p. 55, 1982) used the category as defined by Planning Committee minutes; Pain (1980, p. 44) as defined by the building register; and Larkham (1986a) and Cooper (1984, p. 13) used the indication of a planning application for consent to a change of use. These definitions are not compatible. Planning applications note only `material change of use', and Heap (Ed., vol. 2, section 2-815) states that "the application of the formula [to determine change of use] in individual cases contains often a significant element of subjective judgement, and is regarded by the courts as being primarily a matter of fact and degree for the Secretary of State". A geographer probably has an instinct to classify change of use as being change of function, but this is clearly not the same as the planner's view (and, after all, these data sources were designed for planning use): "The precise meaning of `material' ... is not altogether clear ... it appears from some decisions of the Minister [now Secretary of State], and also from the courts, [thay they] have at some times felt that between one use and another of broadly similar character there will be development [ie a change of use] if, and only if, change to the other use will have a substantial effect on the amenities of the neighbourhood ..." (Heap, Ed., vol. 4, section 6-085). There are few guidelines to define `material', thus what is deemed `material' and will therefore appear on the planning register is an individual decision by each local planning authority's planning officers, guided by the Town and Country Planning (Use Classes) Orders, which themselves change. (See Heap, 1987, pp. 121-135.) Some measure of inconsistency may thus arise. Changes of use per se do not require an application under the building regulations: only those where the new use entails structural changes are found when using building plans as a data source. Both data sources nevertheless provide more reliable and internally consistent data than Luffrum's field survey technique.
Checkerboard/Chequer plan
U.S. term for grid plan.
City Beautiful movement - U.S. planning terminology
U.S. movement to `beautify' cities, which has pre-Civil War origins. Term usually applied to the movement and period post-1902, following the report of a Senate commission on planning proposals for Washington D.C. (Reps, 1967, pp. 70-138). These proposals generated a new wave of interest in `civic beautification' (Sutcliffe, 1981, pp. 97-99; Reps, 1965, pp. 497-525).
Classical - architectural style
The influence of Greek and Roman architecture was revived during the Italian Renaissance. During the C18th and first two-thirds of the C19th, classical design elements were used widely, especially for public buildings. Major characteristics included the use of classical elements: columns, pilasters, pediments and shallow roofs concealed by parapets. Classical buildings rely on symmetry about a focal point and restraint in the use of materials. Elements of this style are found in post-Modern classical.
Closed building development - Conzenian terminology
"The arrangement of plot dominants in rows or terraces of more than eight houses" (Conzen, 1969, p. 124).
Cocktail belt
A term used by Whitehand (1967) to describe the belt of middle-class residential areas in the urban-rural fringe of major cities, and specifically London. See Whitehand (1988a).
Colonial town - settlement type
A town established by colonial powers to act as a focus for the transfer of colonial wealth back to the homeland, to consolidate the conquest of the country, and to impose a culture or religion upon the colony. Usually used of European colonisation of Africa and the Americas (Reps, 1965), but there are other examples of colonial town plantation, such as those of the Normans in medieval England and Ireland (Marshall, 1968; Graham, 1988) and by the Germans in many parts of medieval Europe (Clarke and Simms [Eds], 1985, Section III). Characteristically, they are strongly defended settlements and are linked by a good transportation network, or are coastal settlements. They are carefully planned, often with a grid-plan layout, often centred upon an administrative functional area, with ceremonial features such as malls. They have little in common with the form of native settlements. See King (1976).
Company suburb/town - settlement type
Mining, industrial or manufacturing suburbs or entire towns developed by a company to house workers adjacent to their workplace. Allen (1966) discusses 191 U.S. company towns. The employer had greater control over the workers and their families - in the workplace (as employer), in the town (as shopowner, educator and administrator) and in the home (as landlord). For example, control was often exercised by payment in Company credit or token rather than cash. A number of these settlements were run on idealistic lines, such as New Lanark, the idealist there being Robert Owen, who attempted to create a socialist settlement. As cities grew in the mid-C19th to early C20th, many companies moved to the peripheries of existing settlements and established company suburbs: eg in Berlin, the Siemens company developed Siemensstadt (Ribbe, 1985), and in/L ?d_, a small number of paternalistic industrialists developed the `hydro-industrial' area with factories, shops, houses and a fire station (Koter, 1969). The employer frequently provided cheaper and a higher standard of housing and community facilities than were available in the rest of the city, with the aim of attracting the best workers to their factory. It was common for there to be a religious basis to the philanthropy of these industrialists: Titus Salt, an evangelist Christian, established Saltaire (Bradford) in 1850 with the aim of improving housing conditions for wool mill workers; and the Cadbury family developed Bournville (Birmingham), a suburb to be run on Quaker principles, in 1879.
Complementary building development - Conzenian terminology
"Retarded building development taking place on parcels of unbuilt land within an otherwise built- up area and completing the plan-unit of that area. It often results in architectural incongruence" (Conzen, 1969, p. 124). These parcels of unbuilt land may include agricultural residuals, plots that have been previously unattractive for development, or open spaces within the urban fabric. This is a sub-set of new building.
Composite town-plans
A town plan consisting of a number of discrete plan-units that reflect the particular circumstance of their creative phase. It is becoming apparent that the majority of English towns are composite in character (Slater, 1990c): compare the analysis of Lichfield by Bassett (1982) with that by Slater (1986b).
Comprehensive redevelopment - planning terminology
A fashion prevalent in post-WWII British planning for the wholesale clearance and redevelopment of sizeable urban areas, particularly in inner cities (see Esher, 1981). A sub-set of new building.
Compulsory purchase - planning terminology
Power of the State or local authority to compel landowners to sell sites. Often used in the assembly of large sites for comprehensive redevelopment. In Germany, this practice is controlled by the Enteignungsgesetz (Expropriation Law) of 1874.
Concretion
The formalisation of structures when permanent buildings replace temporary forms within an established plan-unit. Market concretions are the most common examples. SEE: encroachment
Conservation
SEE: urban conservation
Conservation area - planning terminology
Areas established initially under the Civic Amenities Act, 1967, as amended by the Town and Country Planning Act, 1971. They are "areas of architectural or historic interest, the character or appearance of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance" (1971 Act, Section 277). There are in excess of 6,300 areas in Great Britain, the majority of which are in town centres, but residential and industrial areas, and village centres, are also included. Over and above the normal planning controls, the local planning authority has the ability to refuse planning applications for development on the grounds of design and construction where the proposals would be detrimental to the aesthetic character of the conservation area. This is one of the few types of area where the exercise of aesthetic control is currently found acceptable (Punter, 1986a). These areas have parallels in U.S. `historic districts' and `heritage sites', and French secteurs sauvegardes.
Conservation Area Consent - planning terminology
Since the Town and Country Amenities Act, 1974, Listed Building Consent has been required for the demolition of any building in a designated conservation area. Conservation area consent was introduced to resolve the anomaly of Listed Building Consent applications being made for unlisted buildings in a conservation area (Department of the Environment, 1987).
Consultant - agent of change
Some studies have identified consultants (Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 501; Freeman, 1983, 1986a), although often without defining them. It has been noted that they are usually `consulting engineers' and may, for example, make structural calculations for use by architects and builders. However, some practices of architects have their own structural engineers, and some consulted practices have titles such as `Architects and Consulting Engineers', so care must be taken to ascertain in which capacity a practice is being consulted.
Consequent streets - Conzenian terminology - street type
"An annular street or set of streets developing along an antecedent fixation line as the site successor of a previous topographical feature of linear extent such as a line of fortification" (Conzen, 1969, p. 124).
Contextualism - planning - architectural terminology
Term coming into use in Britain in the mid- to late-1980s to describe the increased concern of both planners and architects with the influence of the immediate environment, or context, on a building. This roughly parallels the rise of the post-Modern architectural style (Tugnutt and Robinson, 1987).
Conzenian
Pertaining to, or characteristic of, an adherent of the doctrines of M.R.G. Conzen (see Whitehand [Ed.], 1981, chaps. 1,6, 1987a especially Fig. 1, 1987b).
Copyhold - interest in land
A form of tenure in which title was substantiated by the tenant's ability to produce a copy of the legal document (eg entry in court roll) noting acquisition of the property. It developed from later medieval villein tenures, and was widespread by the Tudor period (Adams, 1976, p. 15).
Court housing - building type
Industrial working-class housing, consisting of two parallel, facing rows of houses with a wide pathway between them, laid out at right-angles to a thoroughfare to form a self-contained unit, usually of between 12 and 22 houses (Forster, 1972, p. 1).
Cul-de-sac - street type
A street closed at one end. Also known as `close', `blind alley' or `dead end'. Widely used in residential planning from the mid-C20th, especially in attempts to segregate pedestrians and local traffic from through traffic.
Curtilage - planning terminology
An area attached to a building (usually a dwelling-house) as part of its enclosure. In most cases, the plot is coterminous with the curtilage.
Customary tenure - interest in land
"Customary tenantes are those that hold theyr land by copye of court role, after the custom of the manor": SEE: copyhold(Adams, 1976, p. 15).
Defences
SEE: urban fortifications
Demolition - fabric change
Few studies have demolition as a separate category of built-fabric change. Cooper (1984, p. 13) wished to differentiate "demolition with no subsequent rebuilding", and Larkham (1986a) recorded demolitions for a specific conservation-related reason. Other than this, demolition does not seem to require separate classification, since it is inherent in the concept of redevelopment/rebuilding.
Density - planning terminology
SEE: residential gross density although 'density' is the usual term used.
Department store - building type
Large building for retail use; operated by one firm but containing a number of specialised retail departments (eg mens clothing; ladies clothing; food; toys; kitchen goods etc.). Became common in late C19th, the archetypal example being Harrods.
Depositor - agent of change
For both building plans and planning applications, agents usually act on behalf of initiators [applicants], and liaise between them and the local planning authority. They may be recorded as a separate agent of change, although analysis (Larkham, 1986a; Freeman, 1986a) suggests that, as such, their influence is limited since the great majority of agents are the architects of the application, or another agent of change involved in the fabric change, acting in a dual role. To avoid confusion between `agent' and the widely used term agent of change, the term depositor is frequently used for this category.
Derivative plot - Conzenian terminology
"A secondary plot carved from a parent plot by partition" (Conzen, 1969, p. 124). This division may be by truncation, medial division or other form of partition: Examples of derived plots in the modern residential townscape are given by Jones et al. (1988, pp. 13-17).
Design - planning terminology
A term used to describe the form of a layout or architectural style.
Design control - planning terminology
SEE: aesthetic control
Design guide - planning terminology
A publication by local planning authorities in which they recommend to developers their policies of design. In general, it is "a set of design principles and standards required by the local planning authority and applying to a wide area and not just a particular site" (Llewelyn-Davies et al., 1976). The first of these, A design guide for residential areas, was published by Essex County Council in 1973. The aim was to provide a stimulus to architects and designers for more imaginitive design and to provide informal specialist advice before a scheme becomes too advanced. It stimulated much debate (Smales and Goodey, 1985), led to replication and adaptation by a number of other authorities, and to the application to other design problems such as the use of trees and landscaping, provision of open space and the treatment of development in aesthetically sensitive sites, such as those in conservation areas or listed buildings.
Detached house - building type
A dwelling not physically attached to any other, and most often set in its own grounds. These characteristics ensure that this is a housing type for upper socio-economic groups; however, a vogue for detached housing in Britain during the 1970s and 1980s has seen a more general application of this type. `Cottage' or `villa' in North American usage (cf Holdsworth, 1986).
Detailed planning application - planning terminology
SEE: planning application
Developer - agent of change
Used by many studies. A nebulous term, since the developer may not be the builder (actual construction may be sub-contracted), may not be the initiator, and is rarely the occupier of the building. Some organisations develop for speculative sale (eg housebuilders); some for commercial lease (for example, the Prudential Assurance Co. from the 1930s; and many `property companies' in the post-WWII period); some develop for specific clients, who are the initiator and occupier of the resulting development (for British superstores, see Larkham, 1988c) - they may thus produce bespoke developments.
Development
(1)planning terminology "Any building, engineering, mining or other operations in, on, over or under land" (Town and Country Planning Act, 1962, Section 12). All development is subject to planning permission save minor changes for which de facto permission is given in the General Development Order.
(2)colloquial planning terminology Any building; particularly during the period when construction is planned or taking place; often used in property advertisements ("an exciting new retail development ..."). ]
(3)colloquial Gradual unfolding or growth; [in the non-biological sense] evolution (Chambers Dictionary); make progress, become fuller or bigger or more elaborate or systematic (OED).
Development agent - agent of change
Term coined by Healey et al. (1982) and McNamara (1986) to describe the increasing involvement of multi-functional estate agents in the development process.
Development control - planning terminology
The formal administrative process through which applications for permission to develop land are considered (McNamara, 1985). It is usually operated separately from other sections of planning departments that have responsibility for strategic planning, policy and local plan formation.
Development control data - data source
SEE: planning application This term is used to encompass planning applications, decision notices, officers' resports and correspondence. They can be used with considerable accuracy to measure the volume and nature of change to the built fabric (Larkham, 1988d). It is difficult to use these data for policy evaluation (McNamara, 1985, p. 461). Many studies (eg Brotherton, 1982) use summaries of development control data that are usually regarded as being unsuitable (McNamara and Healey, 1984). Hebbert (Ed.) (1989) gives a useful summary of this data source and its potential applications.
Development pressure - planning terminology
Colloquial term, inadequately defined, to describe demand for development. Usually measured using some form of analysis of actual or aggregate development control data. This concept and its measurement are discussed in Larkham (1990b).
Developmental method - method of analysis
A research procedure in which development (here = urban growth) is investigated in a chronological sequence (Whitehand [Ed.], 1981, p. 13).
Dispersed urban development - Conzenian terminology
Large plots of land situated in the countryside, often Green Belt, in proximity to an urban area and occupied by land uses that are urban in character and depend upon the nearby settlement. Conzen (1960, p. 61) suggests that these may form the distal or outer advance zone of a fringe belt. They may also form a detached part of an arterial ribbon.
Division
SEE: plot division
Doppelstadt - settlement type
Ger. `double town', see von der Dollen (1990). Two medieval towns founded side-by-side, usually by different lords, sometimes in different periods. The two may thus have morphologically distinct plans and/or separate administrations.
Edwardian - architectural style
Architectural style characteristic of the reign of Edward VII (1901-1910). In practice, the period lasts from the end of the C19th to the end of WWI (Whitehand, 1984). The influences of the Edwardian period were the experimental work of the Arts and Crafts architects, the Art Nouveau movement in Europe, and the separate revival of English Baroque, which came to prominence as British Gothic architects were nearing the end of their careers enabling such practitioners as Voysey, Blomfield and Lethaby to exert influence (Service, 1977).
Element complex - Conzenian terminology
"The totality of plan elements of one particular kind in a town plan viewed separately from others. There are three element complexes, ie the street system, the plot pattern and the building pattern" (Conzen, 1969, p. 125). These three elements are central to the Conzenian analysis and the delineation of regions for the purposes of townscape management (Conzen, 1975, p. 95 et seq., 1988).
Elevation
Vertical dimension of a building; eg architectural drawing of a faade.
Encroachment
Buildings taking up land formerly part of a street or market place (concretion). "On the subject of encroachments on streets and lanes, there is Oxford evidence for cellars partly underlying lanes and suggesting that house-fronts had actually been pushed back at some later date. At Winchester, certainly, lanes were indeed kept open by municipal fiat. However, although fines for encroachments were common enough in medieval borough records, there is little to establish either that the fines were paid or that the encroachments were successful. Evidence was cited of successful and extensive encroachments at Lincoln, Stamford and York" (Platt, 1976b, p. 56). For examples in London, see Brooke and Kier (1975).
Environment, Department of
English government department responsible for all aspects of planning and development policy. Formed in 1970; functions were previously part of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. Issues periodic Advice Notes and Circulars; administers the planning appeal process. Headded by the Secretary of State for the Environment. Note: in Scotland and Wales these functions are administered by the Scottish Office and the Welsh Office.
Estate
(1)Area of land under control of single landholder; eg the urban estates of the landed aristocracy.
(2)Area of land with single land use and usually layout; common examples are the housing estate and industrial estate.
Estate agent - agent of change
Intermediary in the process of land sale or acquisition, becoming increasingly active in aspects of the development process (McNamara, 1984; Larkham, 1986c) to a point where they may be termed development agents (Healey et al., 1982; McNamara, 1986). In U.S. terms, `real estate agent' or `realtor'.
Extension - fabric changes
See paragraph 1 of building adaptation. The term addition is generally preferred.
Extra-mural
Outside the town walls: hence extra-mural suburb; extra-mural street. Such development may occur because pressure on land within the walls is too great, or because further development is not permitted there. Contrast with intra-mural.
Extension planning - Ger. planning terminology
Period c. 1875-1890s when industrialising towns in Germany were rapidly expanding out of their traditional fortified inner areas. See Sutcliffe (1981, pp. 19ff.). For the major mechanism of extension planning, SEE: Fluchtliniengesetz
Exultantenstdte - settlement type
German towns founded principally to house religious refugees, often with a strong mercantile influence and thus supported by the local ruler (Stoob, 1970, vol. 1).
Faade - architectural term
Usually the exterior front wall of a building (from Ital. facciata) - although some buildings, such as those on corner sites, may have more than one faade.
Faade changes - fabric changes
Many studies of C20th urban form have been of commercial districts, where building faade changes are sufficiently frequent and distinct to form a separately identifiable group, usually shopfront changes (eg Blacker, 1987). Faade changes do not always form an identifiable grouping in residential areas. Luffrum (1979, p. 120) points out that these changes are actually a sub-set of building adaptations. Earlier studies used field inspection to determine changes, Whitehand (1979, p. 563) seeking the oldest identifiable external ground floor feature and its relation to building age, and Luffrum (1979, pp. 121-122; 1980; 1981, p. 164) using a subjective impression as Whitehand's method "can on occasions be unrepresentative of the shopfront as a whole" (idem, 1979, p. 121). Later studies (Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 490; Freeman, 1983, p. 2, 1986a; Whitehand, 1983a; Larkham, 1986a; Jones, 1987; Sim, 1976, p. 44, 1982) have identified faade changes from planning and building records. Cooper (1984, p. 13), Bastian (1978), Mattson (1983), Pain (1980, p. 44) and Blacker (1987) refer specifically to shopfronts, excluding - not specifically, but by implication - all other faades. Pain also makes a distinction between new and altered shopfronts, a distinction of scales that others (eg Sim, 1976, p. 44) do not use, partly owing to the difficulty of stating when an alteration becomes a whole new front. Pain (1980) does not resolve this problem. Larkham (1986a), working with both commercial and residential areas, includes some residential faade changes, particularly window replacements. Other changes such as extensions, which may also affect the faade, are not included; this is an inconsistency. A distinction is also made between faade alterations and those applications dealing solely with the placement of signs, whether they be nameboards or projecting signs on a shop faade, or others such as free-standing pub signs. This is owing to the number of applications for specific consent to display advertisements (Town and Country Planning [Control of Advertising] Regulations; latest edition 1984; see Heap, 1987, chapter 12). These would otherwise distort an all-encompassing faade category.
Fascia - architectural term
(1)A broad band, sometimes projecting, used in Classical architecture, eg in architraves.
(2)The name-board above a shop-front; being derived from Classical prototypes employing fasciae.
Fenestration - architectural term
The arrangement of windows on the faade of a building.
Fire insurance records - data source
(1)Detailed registers of property insured by specific fire insurance companies (C18th-C19th) (Beresford, 1983).
(2)Systematic block plans of urban areas produced by or for fire insurance companies to assess risks (construction materials and land uses etc. are specified) and to prevent an over- concentration of a company's risks in any given area (Aspinall, 1975). The main such company in Britain is Chas. E. Goad Ltd (Rowley, 1984); in the U.S. the equivalent is Sanborn. Both types of record are invaluable data sources for urban form.
First-cycle development
Initial development on green-field sites most frequently on the urban-rural fringe (Pompa, 1988). Later intensification of development or redevelopment on these sites is termed second-cycle development.
Fixation line - Conzenian terminology
The site of a linear feature that has, at some time, provided a barrier to development. Fortifications, such as a town wall, mark the traditional stationary fringe of an ancient town. During subsequent growth of the settlement it forms a line between the intra-mural and proximal extra-mural inner fringe belt. Fixation lines may also take the form of physical features such as rivers; man-made features such as railways; or even intangible features, eg local authority planning area boundaries, parish boundaries or the pattern of land ownership. As economic, social, demographic and political pressures for urban development exceed the barrier of resistance formed by a fixation line, the town will expand beyond its confines. It is usual that this urban fringe is of a lower density and of more open form than that part of the town inside the fixation line. Even when the physical structure of resistance is removed, forms on the ground tend to reflect the line of the barrier (for example, annular streets follow the line of walls).
Flat - building type
British usage; SEE: apartment
Flatted terrace - building type
A terrace of houses comprising one flat on each floor. Access is obtained through separate front doors, either along the street or from a courtyard. A characteristic form of Tyneside and London (Muthesius, 1982, pp. 130-137).
Fluchtliniengesetz - Ger. planning terminology
Law on Street Lines (1875). This strengthened municipal powers to draw up urban extension planning schemes, and confirmed that it was a municipality's duty to do so. Made automatic the compulsory purchase of land required for new streets, allowed costs of building, drainage and lighting along new streets to be transferred to the owners of street frontages (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 19). A most significant stage in the late C19th expansion of German industrial towns.
Form complex - Conzenian terminology
SEE: element complex
Fringe belt - Conzenian terminology
Fringe belts, or Stadtrandzone, were first identified by Louis (1936) in a study of Berlin. The city walls, and latterly the line of the city walls, formed a barrier to the physical growth of urban areas (SEE: fixation line. The concept was refined by Conzen (1960) in his study of Alnwick, and by Whitehand (1967a, 1974, 1988b). Conzen describes the fringe belt as "a belt-like zone originating from the temporary stationary or very slowly advancing fringe of a town and composed of a characteristic mixture of land-use units initially seeking peripheral location. ... In towns with a long history this geographical result emerging gradually from these dynamics is often a system of successive, broadly concentric fringe belts more or less separated by other, usually residential integuments" (Conzen, 1969, p. 125) (SEE: residential accretion) A typical pattern would be: a first or inner fringe-belt (Conzen, 1960, pp. 58 et seq.) surrounding the kernel of a town, about an antecedent fixation line; one or more intermediate or middle fringe-belts (Ibid., pp. 80 et seq.) which are not usually closed and are separated from the inner belt by other, generally residential, integuments; and the most recent or outer fringe-belt (Ibid., pp. 105 et seq.) along the current urban-rural fringe. Fringe belts constitute a major element in the internal structure of cities (Whitehand, 1988b, pp. 54-55) especially where a fixation line has had a powerful constraining influence. The implications for townscape management are considerable. A regulated scheme of management is difficult to formulate in these areas of irregular form and low-density land use. Changes in fringe belts are discussed by Conzen (1962) and later by Whitehand (1974, 1988b) and Barke (1976, 1990). "The absorbtion of a fringe-belt component by a functionally different, usually residential, integument" (Conzen, 1969, p. 125) is referred to as fringe-belt alienation. Fringe-belt reduction is "the loss of component plots on part of a fringe belt either by fringe-belt translation or by alienation" (Ibid., p. 125), where translation is the transfer of a land-use unit, or plot, from an older fringe belt to a more recent one (Ibid., p. 126). There are problems with the definition of fringe belts (von der Dollen, 1990, p. 321). "..[T]he urban fringe-belt is characterised by spontaneity, not planning, and is typified by the singular relocation of individual functions from the centre to the periphery". Von der Dollen argues that where cities have expanded by administrative act, a fringe belt is not created, since "decisions on users, reasons for removal, and space requirements are here made at the lowest, individual, level, whereas city expansion requires a legal act". He thus defines fringe belt as both form and process. There is also a problem of scale and quantity. "Disparate residential development along arterial routes remains a characteristic of the urban fringe-belt until it is systematically integrated into the urban entity - a process which only results from a substantial growth spurt brought about by, and steered by, planned decision-making" (Ibid.).
Freehold - interest in land
An absolute interest in land or property; ownership. The superior interest in such property, the notion of a paramount seignory essential to early feudal tenures, is little more than a subject of convention (Adams, 1976, p. 17).
Frontage - Conzenian terminology
The interface between main access street or waterway with the boundary of a plot. It is measured as the length of street line taken up by it (Conzen, 1960, p. 31). In the U.S., `front-feet' are sometimes used an a measure for apportioning assessments. A metrological analysis of burgage frontages in medieval towns (Slater, 1981) demonstrates that this division of plots reveals much about town development and the stability of plot frontage widths within planned extensions.
Full planning application - planning terminology
SEE: planning application
Garden city - settlement type
A satellite town, "located at a distance from the parent city, surrounded by an agricultural belt, and developed on land held in common by the community" (Cherry, 1988, p. 65). The form and social and economic structures of garden cities follow (with some adaptations) the ideas of Ebenezer Howard (1902).
Garden city movement
Following Ebenezer Howard's book Tomorrow: a peaceful path to real reform (1898) and its more popular reprint (Howard, 1902) the Garden City Movement grew as a pressure group advocating the planning of new settlements to cater for an expanding population (MacFadyen, 1933). These settlements were to have much open space; their economic and social structures were to be controlled. In Germany, the Deutsche Gartenstadtgesellschaft (Ger. `Garden City Society') was founded in 1902: a pure expression of the semi-rural ideal, which was soon watered down. Only one German garden city approached economic independence: Hellerau, nr. Dresden (1908 onwards); most were merely high- standard housing areas adjoining existing urban areas (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 41; Hartmann, 1977). The French Association des Cits-Jardins de France attracted influential support, but used a lax definition of garden city, being much concerned with the parks and gardens of existing cities (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 145).
Garden suburb
A suburb, usually planned on the then urban-rural fringe, laid out in accordance with garden city ideals. Found more frequently in central Europe than Britain.
Genetic urban quarter
Those parts of a town that were planned as a unit at any time from the medieval period to the present day. Genetic urban quarters usually have particular functional, administrative or social characteristics represented within a plan-unit or layout. Examples may include planned medieval extensions; occupational quarters of early modern towns; factory suburbs; garden suburbs; villa districts; or building society estates. The term is found in the Germanic literature; this working definition was used during the Third Anglo-German Conference on Urban Historical Geography, 1988. The relationship between genetic urban quarters and morphological regions is, as yet, unresolved.
Genius loci - Conzenian usage
"The genius or guardian spirit of a place", used by Conzen (eg 1975, p. 82) to indicate the character of a location. Apparently synonymous with the more popular term `spirit of place' (eg Ford, 1974). Occasionally used by planners and architects (Esher, 1988).
Gentrification
A process of neighbourhood social change, having inevitable consequences for the built fabric. It involves gradual replacement of an existing, poorer, lower-class or deprived community by wealthier, higher-class occupants. They begin a process of building and area rehabilitation and renovation, for owner-occupation or as speculation. Dilapidated, often subdivided, houses are converted back to high- class single-family dwellings. The social characteristics of an area thus change. This is the reverse of the usual `downward filtering' process. See Smith and Williams (1986).
Geometrical analysis - method of analysis
Analysis of plots, particularly medieval burgages, with especial reference to relative proportions of width and length (Slater, 1988, 1990c, pp. 74-77).
Georgian - architectural style
Blanket name given to styles popular in the reigns of George I - IV. Mose of these were developments of the classical style, using regular symmetrical fenestration, using columns, pilasters, pediments, cornices hiding shallow-pitched roofs, and so on. Red brick and stone were predominant building materials; the former sometimes covered by stucco. Plan elements characteristic of this morphological period include squares, crescents and circuses (Summerson, 1962). Regency is a later development of this style (early C19th).
Gothic - architectural style
Predominant medieval style for cathedrals, churches and public buildings, with subdivisions into Early English, Decorated and Perpendicular. Characterised by pointed arches, use of elaborate tracery and stone carving, steeply pitched roofs, towers and pinnacles. This style became unfashionable during the Georgian period of classical styling (late C17th - C18th), but was revived in the mid-Victorian period by architects such as A.W.N. Pugin (Dixon and Muthesius, 1978). Note, however, the `Gothick' popularised by Walpole during the early C18th.
Green belt - planning usage
An area of predominantly open agricultural land surrounding major settlements where further urban expansion is strictly limited by legislation. Green Belts were initially envisaged by the Garden City Movement to set urban areas against a background of open country and containing only extensive land uses and agriculture (Howard, 1902); but it was not until 1938 that Britain's first formal green belt, around London, was legalised (Thomas, 1970). In a Circular of 1955 the Government encouraged local planning authorities to include green belts in local development plans. This conflicted with the need, in the largest conurbations, for new housing at the urban-rural fringe to replace dwellings lost in slum-clearance schemes. Belts around most large urban areas were proposed as a result of the 1955 Circular but not approved until the 1970s (Hall, 1982). Growing pressure for development within a settlement may `leap-frog' the constraints of the green belt to more distant, less strictly-controlled, areas (Hall et al., 1973; Munton, 1983) which are easily accessible by trunk roads and motorways, Land uses, except agricultural and some mineral extraction, are prohibited unless they encourage leisure and recreation. However, central government policy in the 1980s has weakened many of the green belt controls allowing selective - usually large-scale - residential developments in a `green setting'. With these changes to official policy, the future of the green belt concept is uncertain. A number of academics and planners favour a green wedge, rather than belt (G.E. Cherry, pers. comm.), allowing a greater proportion of quasi-rural land closer to city centres. However, local and county authorities are struggling to sustain the quality of their hard-fought-for approved green belt (Elson, 1986).
Grid plan/gridiron layout
A rectilinear layout of streets and street-blocks. This form of layout is characteristic of colonial towns, new towns, Victorian residential suburbs and some medieval planned extensions. It has been the mark of the founded town since ancient times, producing an efficient circulation system, and a distribution of equal rectangular plots. Reps (1965, pp. 295-324) discusses C19th U.S. town plans, many developed on the basis of a single grid or cluster of them. See M.P. Conzen (1990) for a case study of Omaha. Also known as chequer/checker/checkerboard plan.
Gr?d - Polish building type
A fortified ringwork castle significant in the early development of many Polish towns.
Half-timber - building material/style
SEE: timber frame
High street - street type
Main street of a (usually) smaller town; sometimes widened to form a street market; street name sometimes persists in larger towns and cities, but the function may have changed.
High-street layout - Conzenian terminology
"A medieval plan-unit showing traditional, long strip plots or deep burgages arranged in series on either side of a major traffic street widened to provide a street market (Ger. `strassenmarkt')" (Conzen, 1969, p. 126).
Historical/Historic
A confusion over the use of these terms has arisen. OED definitions are: Historical: (1)Of, or pertaining to, history.
(2)Relating to, or concerned with, history or historical events.
(3)Dealing with history.
(4)Celebrated or noted in history. Historic: (1)Of, or belonging to, history; historical.
(2)Forming an important part or item of history, noted or celebrated in history, having an interest or importance due to connexion with historical events (the prevailing current sense).
(3)Conveying or dealing with history = historical. Confusion is evident in usages connected with, eg, towns and preservation. Towns would normally be of historical importance, eg when they are concerned with history generally, while a single event can be historic. `Historic' is widely used in North America (eg Ford, 1974).
Historic district - U.S. planning terminology
U.S. equivalent to U.K. conservation area.
Historicism - architectural style
The use of historical architectural features in new buildings, recently used to replace revivalism and Victorian eclecticism (see Lampugnani [Ed.], 1986, pp. 147-150). Historicist forms have been much used in Post-Modern architecture, but its greatest application has been in the more or less preservation- conscious post-war reconstruction of historic city centres destroyed in WWII (Ibid., p. 149), more usually in continental Europe (Diefendorf, 1989). SEE: Post-Modern SEE: neostyles and SEE: vernacular.
Historicity - Conzenian terminology
Historical expressiveness, usually in relation to the townscape. Frequently used to denote the embodiment in the townscape of the creations of past societies.
House - building type
A dwelling; a building for human habitation. Generally used with reference to single-family dwellings, or those originally built as such but now used for other functions. Single-floor dwellings in multi- storey blocks are usually not referred to as houses - they are apartments, flats or tenements: SEE: block housing
Infill
A general term used to categorise the increase of densities in a townscape as repletion occurs. OED notes first use in this context in 1971 - P. Gresswell, Environment, "it is possible to `infill' between two distant houses...". See Whitehand (1989); Whitehand and Larkham (1990).
Inherited outline - Conzenian terminology
SEE: morphological frame
Initiator - agent of change
This is a popular term used to describe the person or organisation upon whose behalf a fabric change is initiated. Initiators may be identified from building plans (Whitehand, 1983b; Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 494; Freeman, 1983, 1986a, 1988; MacGregor, 1984, p. 20), although MacGregor notes that the initiator may be referred to in the Register as the owner. The category of applicant in planning applications is broadly similar to that in building records (Larkham, 1986a, 1986b; Callis, 1986) although, since there are usually separate data concerning interest in property, MacGregor's simplification (initiator = owner) is not always justified. Initiators may be divided into categories of owner-occupier and speculative developer (Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 496; Freeman, 1983, 1986a; MacGregor, 1984, p. 20), although "the distinction is not always clear-cut". An initiator may be recognised as a speculative developer if known to be an architect (prior to 1920 only: SEE: architectand Edwards, 1981, pp. 132ff) or a SEE: builder if firms or companies, or if the name appears more than once in the Register (MacGregor, 1984, p. 20), and if the motive in building is profit by resale or lease. Owner-occupiers have the desire to use the building themselves from the outset, although they may sub-let part of it. Individual, as opposed to corporate, initiators may be inferred from the Registers, eg by use of the prefix `Mr' (Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 498). Categories of lessee and prospective purchaser may also be identified, particularly from original planning applications. This subdivision of initiators, although potentially useful, is largely based on guesswork (albeit educated), and is thus subject to individual subjective bias.
Institution - agent of change
An organisation, commonly civic (eg university) or religious (eg convent) that requires extensive sites and therefore initiates or funds development, usually on the urban fringe. Institutions often continue to undertake development during building cycle slumps, when other developers are less active (Broaderwick, 1981; Whitehand, 1987c, 1988b).
Integument - Conzenian terminology
Additions and extensions to the town beyond the limits of the traditional kernel plan-units (Conzen, 1960, pp. 82, 103, 116-118). In U.S. terms, an `annexation'. Integuments may be residential extensions of a single morphological period, such as Victorian villa suburbs (Slater, 1978) or fringe belts.
International style - architectural style
SEE: Modern of which this is a debased variant.
Jugendstil - architectural style
Ger. Art Nouveau.
Kernel - Conzenian terminology
"The centre of a town formed by the earliest, frequently traditional and especially medieval, plan units, often referred to as the Old Town [Ger. `Altstadt'; Polish `stare miasto']. A number of such plan units form a composite kernel" (Conzen, 1969, p. 126).
Klosterhfe - building type
The urban bases of rural monasteries in central European cities. Usually took the form of large courtyard houses with extensive storage facilities and accommodation. Such monastic `inns' are known in London (Lobel, 1989), but are otherwise rare in England.
Land use
The functional application within a unit of land. This has been controlled in towns from the medieval period, where undesirable land users, such as tanners, were relegated to the urban periphery (eg Keene, 1985; Czok, 1979, p. 12). Development around such land-uses may form extra-mural suburbs. Since the Town and Country Planning Act, 1947, local planning authorities have been able to exert control over urban land uses through development plan procedures and, at a micro-scale, by the refusal of planning applications. In the U.S., land use is controlled by a process of `zoning'.
Land-use unit - Conzenian terminology
SEE: plot
Layout
(1)vernacular To spread or display; to dispose of (grounds etc) according to a plan (OED).
(2)Conzenian terminology) "A plan-unit showing an arrangement of streets, plots and building based on a unified design. It may be a residential, industrial or institutional layout" (Conzen, 1969, p. 126. The term `layout' is usually applied to a planned area, usually an accretion to the historic kernel, or as part of a more extensive fringe belt (Conzen, 1960, pp. 71-73).
(3)planning terminology Layouts are used extensively by town planners, and recommended residential or commercial layouts form part of design guides published by local planning authorities. Recommended layouts satisfy the authorities' controls of density, privacy, amenity space, access, the provision of environmental services, car-parking and enable landscape features to be included. Department of the Environment Circular 22/80 (DoE, 1980) stresses that the layout of new residential areas is the responsibility of developers and their customers. It is not the role of the local planning authority to determine layout or design except where its minimum planning standards are not met (eg Punter, 1986a). It can, however, advise on layout either through design guides or by commenting upon submitted planning applications.
Leading type - Caniggian terminology
SEE: tipo portante
Listed building - planning terminology
A building of special architectural or historic interest protected from demolition or alteration under the provisions of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1971 (Section 54). Buildings are listed according to their relative importance: Grade I, buildings of exceptional interest (c. 2%), Grade II*, particularly important buildings of more than special interest (4%), and Grade II, buildings of special interest, that warrant every effort being made to preserve them (94%). There are currently over half a million listed buildings in Britain. Buildings may also be listed for their group value, but this does not give any statutory protection (DoE, 1987).
Listed building consent - planning terminology
This is required for the demolition or alteration to any listed building (Town and Country Planning Act, 1971, Section 55) or to demolish any unlisted building within a conservation area (Town and Country Amenities Act, 1974), though this latter point has now been rationalised by the introduction of conservation area consent. Applications for listed building consent are made to the local planning authority.
Local authority
Municipal or rural authority having responsibility for functions such as service provision, education, planning, etc. Examples include Borough, Metropolitan Borough and Rural District Councils. The local planning authority is usually the planning department (or similar) of the local authority; likewise the building surveyors' department administring the building regulations is a department of the local authority.
Local plan - planning terminology
Document representing the views of a local planning authority. It consists of a written statement of proposed development, traffic management, land use and general improvement and management of the physical environment. This is supplemented by a map and other descriptive matter (Heap, 1987, p. 77 et seq.). Once this plan has been approved by a planning inspector, on behalf of the Secretary of State for the Environment, its contents may be cited to substantiate reasons for refusal of a planning application, or to give guidance to prospective developers on where and what to build.
Local planning authority - planning terminology
The authority in Britain that has responsibility for development control and local plan formulation. In England and Wales these are the District Council or London Borough. In Scotland the Regional Council has responsibility.
Lot
North American usage for plot.
Main street - street type
North American usage - SEE: high street
Major rebuilding - fabric change
Defined as the rebuilding of the majority of a site to give a new form, but where some of the old structure remains. Ross (1979) suggests that if over 20% remains, the change should be called a rebuild (he uses the term `building replacement'); however, without measurement of walls, floor area etc., it is difficult to be quite so precise about this. Ross (1979), Pain (1980), Whitehand and Whitehand (1983) and Freeman (1983, 1986a) extend the category of new building to include major rebuilding. Larkham (1986a) counts it separately. It is impossible (unless there is access to the raw data) to disaggregate a study that has amalgamated these two categories.
Major traffic street - Conzenian terminology - street type
"A street carrying regional traffic into and through the built-up area of a town" (Conzen, 1969, p. 126) (Ger. `Verkehrsstrasse', hist. Fr. `carrire'). Many such streets, having been thoroughfares since the medieval period, have been by-passed by new roads skirting the kernel as modern traffic flows become excessive.
Mall
(1)street type A grand processional way: straight, broad, usually tree-lined; associated with the capital cities of the Absolutist period in Europe (cf boulevard; original avenue). Also a feature of the French architect-designed plan for Washington D.C. (Reps, 1967). The mall forms a prominent element of British imperial city planning in India (Carter, 1981; King's study of Delhi [1976, chs. 8-10] implicitly suggests this).
(2)building type An enclosed area, often for retailing use; a pedestrian area flanked by large stores. Common in North America; being introduced to Europe in the 1980s.
Mannerist - architectural style
C16th architectural style, especially of the Italian Renaissance, that plays with, rather than conforming strictly to, the classical rules of architecture. Led to the Baroque style.
Mansard roof - architectural term
A roof with two contiguous pitches. A common Post-Modern ploy, reducing the apparent height of a building by having the upper storey seemingly within the roof space.
Map
The flat representation of part of the earth's surface, showing physical and political features (OED). Contrast with plan.
Market
A gathering of people for the sale and purchase of provisions, livestock etc. In the medieval period, the acquisition of the right to hold markets, although not a guarantee of success, was vital to the growth of towns, particularly planned/planted towns. The creation or, more frequently, confirmation of market privileges by the monarch was often the first step towards borough status, was part of the general urbanising process, and reached its peak under Henry II and Edward I (Platt, 1976a, p. 31; See Beresford, 1967). For a central European example of the influence of the market in early urbanisation, see Schlesinger (1985).
Market church
Church in a market place; usually having no graveyard, and often originating as a daughter chapel of a mother church that retained burial (and other) rights.
Market colonisation
Process whereby market places were occupied by buildings. This usually took the form of temporary market stalls acquiring a permanent status and being replaced by permanent buildings; characterised by not having plots other than the land actually occupied by the building itself. SEE: concretion; encroachment A further stage of colonisation is the development of a market hall as market functions expand. Other features of colonisation are the market church and market cross.
Market place
Ger. der Markt; Polish targ. A public place, or space, for the purpose of buying and selling; most often at the centre of a town - although during the British civic replanning in the post-war period, many such market-places were removed to the edge of the town centre. Morphologically, the market place is a plan unit most often as an open area populated by itinerant market stalls on market days. As the market becomes more established, the stalls become permanent (SEE: market colonisation. Market places take a variety of forms, that may reflect the period or nature of settlement foundation or planning (Golachowski, 1956). The oldest derive from village greens, common open spaces and the triangular junctions of roads. Triangular market places (eg Alnwick [Conzen, 1960] and Taunton [Aston and Bond, 1976]) are typical of this latter derivation and of markets at the gateways of abbeys, mostly founded in the C11th and C12th. Widened street markets (eg Henley in Arden [Aston and Bond, 1976]) are typical of market towns with no focal junction, a single street town plan. This plan type seems to be typical of the post- c. 1100 period (Ibid., p. 89). The last major market type is trapezoid, commonly known as market squares. These may be regular squares or rectangles in a regular grid-plan layout, or more irregular trapezoids where the ideal regular grid cannot be achieved in practice (eg Lichfield [Slater, 1986b, 1987]).
Market town - settlement type
Ger. Markstadt. Town with a major marketing function for a surrounding hinterland; has morphologically characteristic market features.
Material change of use - planning terminology
Technical term in English planning law; SEE: change of use
Medial plot - Conzenian terminology
A derivative plot developing in the middle of a strip plot between the plot head and plot tail. Medial plots will only develop where there is a longitudinal line of communication, since they have no access to the frontage street or the back lane (Conzen, 1960, p. 65).
Mediation - Conzenian terminology
The lengthwise division of a plot. This enables the occupiers of the derivative plots to retain access on to both frontage street and back lane. This is especially important when wide original burgages are divided (Conzen, 1960, p. 25). Successive divisions may occur.
Messuage
SEE: tenement A plot of land supporting a dwelling and attendant buildings: often a house and garden (Brooke and Keir, 1975, p. xx).
Metamorphic plot pattern - Conzenian terminology
"A plot pattern showing secondary changes caused by amalgamation, division and truncation of plots" (Conzen, 1969, p. 127). These changes occur within individual street blocks and involve no change to the street system.
Metroland - settlement type
A name given to the largely semi-detached suburbia of north-west London originally developed by the Metropolitan Railway during the 1920s and 1930s. Apart from the railway company, other developers acquired areas of agricultural land, creating residential estates and often new shopping and commercial centres in proximity to the railway stations of rural Middlesex, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire (Jackson, 1973, pp. 223-228).
Metrological analysis - method of analysis
Analysis of settlement plans by detailed measurement of plot sizes, preferably using existing surviving plot boundaries but which may also be carried out using old large-scale plans; analysis of regularities in plots in terms of fractions or multiples of old units of measurement such as perches or rods (in standars or local forms) to suggest phases of planning (Kalinowski, 1972; Lafrenz, 1988; Sheppard, 1974; Slater, 1981, 1988, 1990c, pp. 71-74).
Mietshuser - building type
Block of apartments for German middle-class occupation in middle urban districts (Thienel, 1973, p. 135). Common from 1850s, especially in Berlin.
Mietskaserne - building type
Ger. `rental barracks'. Industrial housing; usually multi-storey, housing numerous households, often constructed around a courtyard or light-well. Common from early/mid C19th, particularly in the industrial suburbs especially of Berlin (Borgelt et al., 1988).
Mivre - architectural style
Adapted from Edwards (1981, pp. 18-21): a style derived from Voysey, characterised by long pitched roofs, rendered, roughcast or stone walls, large chimneys and small-paned windows sometimes glazed with `bulls-eyes'.
Modern - architectural style
Style using clean lines and simple faades to express functional and visual compatibility. Its roots are in the advances made during the industrial revolution, as new and cheaper materials became available, and as a reaction against the neo-Classical styles of the Victorian period (Frampton, 1982, pp. 8-40). Early applications were in inter-war continental Europe, where dry climates suited flat roofs and concrete facings, typical of the Modern style. Work by 1920s and 1930s architects such as Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier and of the Bauhaus movement popularised many of the forms. A debased version, widely used from the late 1930s on, became known as the International Style. It was not until the 1950s and 1960s that Modern styles, particularly Brutalist and High-Tech, became commonplace in British towns (Whitehand, 1984). From the mid-1970s, Modern architecture has been much criticised, especially from outside the profession. Post-Modernism is as much a reaction against the brutalism of some Modern forms as Modernism was against the neo-Classical. It has heralded a return to the use of traditional materials and details, a conscious move away from the structural innovations characteristic of modern buildings. See Jencks (1984).
Monastic urban elements
Urban elements deriving from monastic influences are important in many European medieval towns. Such influences range from the large plots and extensive ranges of buildings for monastic use, often found on developing fringe belts to individual monastic town houses or Klosterhfe. Monastic elements may also act as pre-urban nuclei.
Morphogenesis
The creation of physical forms viewed as a developmental or evolutionary process (Whitehand [Ed.], 1981, pp. 1-24).
Morphography - method of analysis
The description of forms without reference to their origins and mode of development (Whitehand [Ed.], 1981, p. 13).
Morphological conformity - Conzenian terminology
The manner in which a plan unit corresponds with the existing plan outline, or morphological frame.
Morphological frame - Conzenian terminology
"An antecedent plan feature, topographical outline, or set of outlines exerting a morphological influence on subsequent more or less conformable plan development, and often passing its features on as inherited outlines" (Conzen, 1969, p. 127). The pattern of development forming the kernel of a town often provides a constraint to the form of future development in the area. The pattern of plots and streets therefore has a morphological influence upon later development. The presence of a rapid change in gradient, or the course of a river, forms topographical outlines around which the development of the town is, initially at least, constrained. See Slater (1989a) for the use of the morphological frame in the analysis of Doncaster. The morphological frame is also an important element in the redevelopment of residential areas (Jones et al., 1988) within the scope of Conzenian townscape precepts.
Morphological period - Conzenian terminology
Any cultural period that exerts a distinctive morphological influence upon the whole or any part of a town. The forms resulting will represent the socio-economic needs of that society and will survive to a varying degree as residual features depending upon the needs of successive societies (see Conzen, 1988). The products of cumulative historic morphological periods make up the morphological frame. There are few sharp boundaries to morphological periods (Whitehand, 1984).
Morphological processes
The set of process shaping urban form. These include adaptive, additive, repletive and transformative processes.
Morphological region - Conzenian terminology
An area of homogenous urban form in terms of plan type, building type and land use (Conzen, 1975). Conzen suggests, but inadequately defines, a hierarchical order of morphological regions, the smallest of which is the morphotope (Conzen, 1988).
Morphology (urban)
The study of form. OED, the history of variation in form (first use 1885); term used by Goethe (Wilkinson and Willoughby, 1962). Thus, urban morphology refers to "the study of the physical (or built) fabric of urban form, and the people and processes shaping it" (working definition advanced by Glossary editors). Use in English in this context dates at least to Leighly (1931). In urban design, the term is proncipally used for "... a method of analysis which is basic to find[ing] out principles or rules of urban design" (Gebauer and Samuels, 1981); although they also note that the term can be understood as the study of the physical and spatial characteristics of the whole urban structure: this is closer to the geographer's usage.
Morphometric analysis - method of analysis
Analysis of the form of urban plots (SEE: metrologicaland SEE: geometrical analysis). Used principally of burgages. Conzen (1988, note 25) provisionally suggests 3 types of burgage, based on morphometric analysis of the length:width ratio (E). E = 4 or less= shallow burgage E = >4 - 7= medium burgage E = >7= deep burgage.
Morphotope - Conzenian terminology
"The smallest urban localities obtaining distinctive character among their neighbours from their particular combination of constituent morphological elements" (Conzen, 1988, p. 259). These elements consist of the characteristics of plan type, building type and land use (Conzen, 1975). A morphotope is essentially the smallest type of morphological region.
Motte and bailey - building type
SEE: castle
Neo-
A new use or arangement of elements of an existing architectural style. In contrast to pseudo- (after Bridger, undated).
Neo-Classical - architectural style
A C18th style in Europe, involving a return to certain aspects of Greek and Roman architecture after the freedom and exuberance of the Baroque. Culminated in the strict scholarliness of the Greek Revival. SEE: classical; Georgian
Neo-Georgian - architectural style
Popular term for buildings with small-paned windows, panelled doors, elaborate classical door surrounds, pillars, pilasters etc. Fashionable in the 1930s for official and institutional buildings and during the 1970s for speculative housebuilding.
Neo-Gothic - architectural style
Revival of medieval forms, principally pointed arches, popular with the revival of Catholicism in England in the early 1800s. Popularised by Pugin and Ruskin (Dixon and Muthesius, 1978, pp. 182 ff.).
Neo-Tudor - architectural style
A new usage or arangement of Tudor style, particularly half-timbering. A few modern buildings are structurally timber-framed; most users of this style employ non-structural timber fixed to the building purely for decorative purposes (See Lancaster's `Stockbroker's Tudor' [Lancaster, 1938]). A fashionable style in the 1980s for speculative housebuilding.
New building - fabric changes
The construction of a wholly new building on a cleared or new site. This category and that of major rebuilding have unfortunately suffered from a multiplicity of names, from `major rebuild' (Whitehand and Whitehand, 1983, p. 487), `new building' (Larkham, 1986a, 1988a; Cooper, 1984, p. 13) and `building replacement' (Ross, 1979, p. 13; Whitehand, 1979, 1983; Luffrum, 1979, 1980, 1981) to `redevelopment' (Whitehand, 1978, 1984; Freeman, 1983; Sim, 1976, p. 73; 1982). Callis (1986, p. 6) uses `total rebuild', `rebuild' and `redevelop' interchangeably. Whitehand and Whitehand (1983) and Freeman (1983, 1986a) amalgamate this category with that of major rebuilding, a potential source of confusion. A number of different strands need to be disentangled. Redevelopment appears to be an unsatisfactory term, as it has strong association with planning usages such as `comprehensive redevelopment'; indeed Heap (Ed.) recognises no other legal meaning for the term. Nevertheless, it has been used as a blanket term for new building by Whitehand (1979) and Bateman (1971). It seems to imply larger units than the single plots most often considered in these studies. Where larger units are involved, eg in the construction of a shopping centre, then use of redevelopment may be valid: but at what level is the line drawn - how many plots are required to become a redevelopment? If the term is used, it should follow Conzen's (1969) definition. Building replacement likewise has connotations, but with single plots: for if many plots are involved, then development becomes more than replacement and becomes redevelopment, as above. New building may entail construction on a new plot, a cleared site (which may already be vacant, or be cleared especially for this development) or may be on a subdivision of an existing plot. The former is rare in town centres; the latter is common in mature residential areas having extensive original plots (Jones et al., 1988). Complementary building development occurs on plots left vacant during the first cycle of development. Ross (1979, p. 13) states that "in reality, a continuum exists between building replacement and building adaptation rather than a sharp break. Therefore, although the definition of a replacement was accepted as the demolition of an existing form and the building of a new one in its place, there was a need to be flexible ... it was decided to apply the criterion that at least 80% of an old building had to be demolished to constitute a replacement".
New town - settlement type
(1)Medieval. A planted town characteristic of western and central Europe (Ger. Neustadt). May have a regular planned layout and/or may be a fortified bastide (Beresford, 1967). The Polish nowe miastro may be a place-name, rather than an independent settlement (see Koter, 1990).
(2)Modern. Modern new towns include company towns and those established in Britain by central government under the New Towns Act, 1946, which provided for the designation of sites and the setting-up of new town development corporations (Aldridge, 1979). The form of many such new towns derives from themes established by the Garden City movement and from North American developments such as the `neighborhood unit'.
Neustadt - settlement type
Ger. `new town'. Refers specifically to a foundation (fully developed in terms of its economy, plan, built form and legal status) developed in the immediate vicinity of an older town (eg Brandenburg and Neustadt Brandenburg). It is a phenomenon found particularly in the new settlement land to the east of the Elbe during the Ostsiedlung (von der Dollen, 1990, pp. 328-329). Usage is thus distinct from the English term.
Occupation road - Conzenian terminology; street type
"A road, lane, alley or footpath providing subsidiary, commonly back, access to adjoining plots or main access other than that by a proper street (Conzen, 1969, p. 127). Ger. Wirtschaftsstrasse. Occupation roads are often termed back lanes or access roads. Their purpose is distributory and not for through traffic.
Original rural landholder - agent of change
Self-evident term, used by Baerwald (1981). A concept little used in English studies, which have tended to focus on second cycle and subsequent development (exceptions include Booth [1989] and Beresford [1988]).
Objectivate - M.R.G. Conzen's usage
"To render objective" (OED: first use in the Contemporary Review vol. XXI, 1873). Used by Conzen (1966, 1975). Not `objectificate', OED "the action of objectifying, or condition of being objectified". To make concrete, to make obvious.
Old Town
SEE: altstadt, kernel
Ornamental villa - building type
Substantial detached houses derived from the small Palladian mansions of the nobility, built in the late C18th and C19th for the professional classes, typically found in the outer fringe belt of British towns. Often found in groups, as ornamental villa suburbs, which are residential integuments. See Slater (1978).
Orthomorphic plot patterm - Conzenian terminology
A plot pattern, of whatever age, that has experienced no change to its form through subdivision, amalgamation or augmentation or in any other way. Conzen (1960, pp. 69-70) uses the term with regard to burgage series, but it may equally be applied to residential integuments and other plot patterns.
Ostsiedlung
The colonising settlement movement of German-speaking peoples east of the Elbe into Slav lands as farmers, traders and merchants.
Other changes - fabric changes
Most researchers feel the need to include a `catch-all' grouping to cater for those fabric changes that could not be accommodated elsewhere in a categorising system. In many cases, these are minor changes (Larkham 1986a; Sim, 1976, p. 13) which may or may not be included during final analysis. Freeman (1983) had a `miscellaneous' category, identical in all but name to the `other changes' of Whitehand and Whitehand (1983, p. 490), to which usage Freeman (1986a) reverts. Sim also had a few `problem cases' that defied all categorisation, and which were ignored in analysis as were his minor alterations; and Cooper (1984) has some `unclassifiable' changes. Few studies using this classification are compatible, since the nature of entries in this section will be determined by the nature of the major change categories of fabric change.
Outline planning application - planning terminology
SEE: planning application
Owner - agent of change
Ownership - interest in land
The initiator may be the owner of the building where a major work is taking place, but for minor work the initiator is often the lessee, and quite frequently in planning applications is given as a prospective purchaser. In the latter cases it is useful to determine the true owner. MacGregor (1984, p. 20) amalgamates owner and initiator, as in his study the two are usually synonymous. Larkham (1988a) obtained data on ownership from some planning applications (unfortunately not all, owing to changes in the forms). Here, however, there is a problem in that, for the requirements of planning law, from 1962 the owner is defined, by Certificate A under Section 16 of the Town and Country Planning Act (1962), as "the applicant is the estate owner in respect of the fee simple ...". Under the 1971 to 1974 Town and Country Planning Acts, and Town and Country Planning (Listed Buildings in Conservation Areas) Regulations (1977), however, `ownership' is defined as "a person having a freehold interest or a leasehold interest [in the property] the unexpired part of which was not less than seven years". It being difficult, if not impossible, to ascertain the ownership of any plot of land, the `owner' entered on a planning application form must be taken at face value. Whitehand (1983a, pp. 43, 46, 1984) notes the importance of owners for building form: considerable if the premises are bespoke or built for owner-occupation; negligible if speculative property is purchased.
Parallel street plan
A street layout in which the principal streets are approximately equidistant. Various types of parallel-street system were employed in planned towns created during the German colonisation of east- central Europe (the Ostsiedlung), especially during the later medieval period (Siedler, 1914).
Parent plot - Conzenian terminology
"An original or primary plot from which secondary or derivative plots have been carved by partition" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128). Parent plots are the product of an original layout or design. They exist, unaltered, in an orthomorphic plot pattern but over time become divided and/or amalgamated. Conzen (1960, p. 56) illustrates this by describing a burgage series, but it may equally be applied to any `original' plot in any layout (see, eg, Jones et al., 1988, pp. 13-17).
Place
Flat, wide, broad urban space (derived from Greek): French use to denote any extensive open urban space. Similar to British square, circus (without necessarily being so regularly planned); Spanish plaza; Catalan plaa; Ger. platz.
Plan
SEE: town plan (1)A drawing made by projection on a horizontal surface especially showing relative parts of (one floor of) a building. A large-scale map of a district (OED). A plan is usually of such a large scale as to differentiate between elements of the town plan. The most common plans used for studies or urban form in Britain are the Ordnance Survey 1:500, 1:1,250 and 1:2,500 series.
(2)planning terminology Colloquial term for planning document: in England, Structure Plan, Local Plan, Unitary Development Plan (Heap, 1987); in the U.S., a Master Plan or Comprehensive Plan may legally be mandated and development may legally be required to be `in accordance' with it.
Plan division - Conzenian terminology
"A geographical group of morphogenetic plan-units, a morphogenetic plan `region' within the town. Urban plan divisions are arrenged in a hierarchy of two or more orders depending upon the size and complexity of the town. The kernel or Old Town, with or without its inner fringe belt depending upon the character of that belt, forms a plan division of the first order as does the totality of integuments outside. Individual integuments are plan divisons of the second order" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128). Individual planned layouts will also form plan divisions of the first order; plot series or street blocks of similar character would constitute second-order divisions, and plots or collections of plots containing similar urban forms may form a third-order plan division. The identification of plan-divisions has many implications for townscape management. If plan divisions, or townscape regions (Conzen, 1988), are areas within a town that are morphologically similar, then second-cycle treatment of these areas may be more sympathetically undertaken as areas of similar form require similar policies for change.
Plan element - Conzenian terminology
The town plan may be divided into three consituent parts or elements: streets, and their arrangement into a street system; plots and their aggregation in street blocks; and buildings within those plots (Conzen, 1960, p. 5). Each combination of these plan elements derives a uniqueness from the characteristics of site and the established morphological frame.
Planned town - settlement type
SEE: New town, Neustadt, planted town
Planner - agent of change
Colloquial term for local authority planning officer.
Planning appeal - planning terminology
The process whereby an aggrieved applicant for planning permission is able to appeal to the Secretary of State at the Department of the Environment against refusals of planning permissions, non- determination within the statutory period of 8 weeks, or conditions attached to grants of planning permission. The Secretary of State may appoint an Inspector to determine the appeal either by written representations or by local public inquiry. Heap (1987, p. 355) suggests that the number of planning appeals is increasing, and that the odds of the appellant succeeding in an appeal are diminishing. Recent government suggestions (in 1989) to charge fees for all planning appeals will reduce the number of appeals and change the types of appellants to those able to afford such costs.
Planning application/permission - planning terminology
The formal procedure of development control in Britain, whereby a prospective developer must apply to the local planning authority for permission to develop land. Planning permission is required for all development not considered to be `permitted development' (General Development Order, 1977, as amended). Outline planning permission (ibid., Article 5[2]) can be granted subject to the condition that there shall be subsequent submission and approval by the local planning authority of any reserved matters relating to siting, design and external appearance of buildings. This is, therefore, only permission for the principle of development. Physical development requires the approval of detailed proposals. Full, or detailed, planning permission enables development to begin without further application to the local planning authority. A detailed application includes all matters of siting, design, materials and exetrnal appearanve. From the date of decision, the developer usually has five years to implement the permission (Town and Country Planning Act, 1971, Section 41[1][a]). The local planning authority must give notice of its decision on a planning application within 8 weeks from the date of receipt, but this may be extended by agreement in writing between the parties (GDO, 1977, Article 7[6] and [6A]).
Planning authority - planning terminology
Colloquial, or short, reference to local planning authority.
Planning blight - planning terminology
Stems from the depreciation in value of land or buildings as a result of planning proposals or development. Property thus affected cannot be sold at the market value existing prior to these proposals or development. Such property, purchased by the local authority in advance of development, may become neglected and derelict.
Planning committee - planning terminology
Committee of elected public representatives that decides each planning application, after receiving advice and recommendations from its professional planning officers.
Planning department - planning terminology
The department within a local authority that administers the development control system; together with other planning aspects such as long-range planning (formulation of Local Plans, Unitary Development Plans etc).
Planning officer - planning terminology
Professionally trained and qualified employee of the planning department, whose function in the development control system is to negotiate with applicants for planning permission and their representatives; to formulate a recommendation on each application, and to present that to the planning committee, who make the final decision.
Planning permission - planning terminology
SEE: planning application/permission
Planning register - planning terminology - data source
Register, usually chronological in order of receipt, of all applications made to the local planning authority for planning permission. As a data source, in Britain the planning register contains brief description of proposal, site location, name and address of initiator and depositor (or agent), dates of receipt and decision, and the decision reached by the planning committee. By statute, a document available for public consultation.
Plan analysis - method of analysis
Often used as shorthand for town-plan analysis.
Plan seam - Conzenian terminology
"A line dividing genetically different parts of a town plan" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128). Adjoining layouts, developments of different morphological periods, and plan units, townscape regions or at the smallest scale, morphotopes, will be divided by plan seams.
Planted town - settlement type
A town created de novo; term often used of medieval new towns created by a feudal overlord (eg Beresford, 1967). Beresford distinguishes between planted towns and `organic' towns, but this distinction may not always be real for, as Slater (1982) suggests, almost all successful plantations were preceded by manorial growth, often with some marketing function. SEE: new town; planned town
Plan unit - Conzenian terminology
A plan unit may be identified in any part of the town plan that is morphologically different from its surroundings - in terms of its streets, plots and buildings. This may be undertaken at differing scales from layouts to individual morphotopes and applies to any area that exhibits internal homogeneity and morphological disunity with neighbouring plots (Conzen, 1960, p. 5, 108 et seq.).
Plat
"The plat of the common American term for a new urban ground plan additional to a city, consisting of a more or less comprehensive street system giving access to individual ownership lots ) grouped in blocks. Plats are also referred to in legal records as `additions' or `subdivisions' (M.P. Conzen, 1990, p. 167 n. 3).
Plaza
SEE: place
Plot
(1)colloquial Piece, usually small, of ground (OED).
(2)Conzenian terminology "A parcel of land representing a land-use unit defined by boundaries on the ground" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128). It is a plan element.
Plot accessory - Conzenian terminology
A building associated with the land use of the plot but not the primary or plot dominant building on that plot. Plot accessories are usually in the `garth' or garden at the tail of the plot. In the medieval town, accessories would have originally been subsidiary buildings to the mercantile function of the plot (Conzen, 1960, pp. 31-32). In residential integuments, accessories may include greenhouses, sheds and garages or, in areas of mixed land use, workshops (for examples see Burnett, 1978, chap. 3).
Plot amalgamation - Conzenian terminology
A process typical of the burgage and redevelopment cycles. Occurs when the requirements of a society become different from those existing when the areas were originally laid out.
Plot boundary
A division between plots, often also separating land ownership units. Primary plot boundaries (Slater, 1981) exist as relict features of the orthomorphic plot pattern. Characteristically, they are straighter and longer than subsequent boundaries that have been added to the morphological frame.
Plot cycle
The burgage cycle is the best-known plot cycle; but similar developmental cycles have been shown to operate for plots in residential areas (Jones, 1990) and town centres (Koter, 1990).
Plot dominant - Conzenian terminology
"The main building associated with the land use of the plot" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128). In medieval towns the plot dominant most frequently occupied much of the street line at the plot head. The remainder of the strip plot (whether burgage or toft) would contain subsidiary buildings or plot accessories. In residential areas the plot dominants follow a building line set back from the street line allowing room for a front garden. Areas of lower residential density tend to have a less formal arrangement of plot dominants.
Plot head - Conzenian terminology
"The smaller but usually more important front part of a strip plot [or other plot] including the frontage and any other land under, and close to, a plot dominant placed on or near the street line" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128).
Plot pattern - Conzenian terminology
The arrangement of plots - considered deparately from the other plan elements - up to the level of street blocks. Areas of homogenous plot pattern may result from a laid-out plot series or formal layout, the constraints of the morphological frame or planning controls.
Plot ratio - planning terminology
SEE: building coverage
Plot series - Conzenian terminology
A row of adjacent plots that share similar building line and development characteristics.
Plot tail - Conzenian terminology
"The larger but usually less important rear part of a strip plot, rarely occupied by a plot dominant" (Conzen, 1969, p. 128). This area, which typically has poor access, is developed to a much lower density than the plot head, and contains plot accessories and the garden (whether for recreation or quasi- productive uses).
Plot truncation
SEE: tail-end plot
Poligono - Spanish planning terminology - settlement type
`Polygon'. Used to denote totally new urban areas, either residential or industrial, created in the post-Civil War period. Especially used of the areas around Madrid.
Post-Modern - architectural style
"A Post-Modern building is ... one which speaks on at least two levels at once: to other architects and a concerned minority who care about specifically architectural meanings, and to the public at large, or the local inhabitants, who care about other issues concerned with confort, traditional buildings and a way of life. Thus Post-Modernist architecture looks hybrid ..." (Jencks, 1984, p. 6). This architectural movement has been classified into six stylistic sub-groups: historicism, straight revivalism, neo-vernacular, ad hoc urbanist, metaphor/metaphysical and Post-Modern space (Jencks and Chaitkin, 1982, p. 110).
Precinct
An area enclosed by a boundary, either physical or administrative. In medieval usage, the immediate surroundings of a building or series of buildings, especially in religious use. C20th usage denotes an area used for a set purpose, eg shopping, civic administration, education etc. Pedestrian precincts segregate pedestrians from vehicles wherever possible; usually used of post-WWII rebuilt town centre redevelopment; also of entire streets that have been pedestrianised (Hass-Klau, 1990).
Preservation
Particularly in U.S. use, synonymous with `conservation'; difference in English use in that `preservation' has come to imply `no change', while `conservation' implies `some planned change'. SEE: urban conservation
Pre-urban nucleus - Conzenian terminology
A plan-unit that pre-dates the development of a town. It usually comprises a church and often buildings of an ecclesiastical order (SEE: monastic urban elements (Slater, 1987, pp. 191-203), or a fortification (Conzen, 1960, p. 21), which gives rise to the settlement adjacent to it. Note, however, that some castles were imposed on existing settlements during periods of colonisation. The pre-urban nucleus is most often the first plan unit (providing the stimulus for further development) (SEE: urbs and is followed by an early suburban integument, which together form the kernel of the Old Town. See Clarke and Simms (Eds), 1985, pp. 30, 108, 499, 672, 678, 696.
Primary plot boundary
SEE: plot boundary
Proto-urban/proto-town - settlement type
In English usage there is a difference in emphasis between proto- and pre-urban, but there appears to be no consistency of usage (Clarke and Simms, 1985, p. 672). Proto-towns "were not towns, but they possessed some of the attributes of genuine towns. The concept corrsponds to the recognised anthropological feature of many societies - that it is common for settlements to be in a state of transition from village, camp or sanctuary to town. This is not to say that all medieval towns in non-Roman Europe necessarily went through such a phase before emerging as fully developed towns" (Ibid., p. 673). It has also been stated that "it is not possible to sustain proto-urbanism: a site is either urban or it is not" (Hodges, 1982, p. 23). This statement appears to ignore often lengthy phases of slow growth and accretion of functions, tending towards the outmoded view of town creation by legislative fiat (SEE: town para. 2).
Pseudo-street sysyem - Conzenian terminology
A pattern of streets that develop within a plan unit as a result of building repletion. The streets are commonly narrow and unsuitable for traffic, but do serve to connect antecedent streets at either end and provide much-needed access to the plot tails of strip plots (Conzen, 1960, p. 66).
Prairie - architectural style
House style developed by Frank Lloyd Wright, of limited spatial distribution in the USA (Bastian, 1980). One characteristic, of shallow-pitched roofs with wide overhanging eaves, can sometimes be recognised in Britain (Larkham, 1988a, 1988b).
Pseudo-
The use of traditional or local materials and features in inappropriate locations and manners (after Bridger, undated). In contrast to neo-.
Real estate
U.S. term for `land', including any development upon the land; for real estate agent SEE: estate agent.
Rear service lane
SEE: alley; back lane/alley
Recession
Phase of the burgage or plot cycles, where building coverage declines from the maximum (climax phase). Recession may end in complete clearance, or urban fallow.
Rebuilding - fabric change
SEE: new building
Rechstadt - settlement type
Ger. `chartered town'. Established medieval town granted full legal status (Schlesinger, 1969, p. 14). This would seem to be the equivalent of the English borough.
Redevelopment - Conzenian terminology
Defined by Conzen (1969, p. 129) as the "development of previously cleared central urban land in response to socio-economic revaluation of the area. May take the form of new building layout or other design for a new land use, replacing the whole or part of an obsolete plan unit ...". Conzen's subdivisions of redevelopment into augmentative and adaptive are also useful, as is his identification of the redevelopment cycle. The term applies to all land having undergone first-cycle development; it is not restricted to central urban areas.
Redevelopment cycle - Conzenian terminology
The process of redevelopment in response to changing socio-economic revaluation of capital investment. In British towns the first redevelopment cycle is usually towards the end of the C18th, when many medieval plots were first cleared, then lay as urban fallow, were amalgamated and redeveloped with broadly constant building coverage towards a climax phase. Then follows a period of piecemeal replacement or a return to a period of urban fallow (Conzen, 1960, p. 91, 94). The burgage cycle is a specialised form of redevelopment cycle; SEE: plot cycle
Regency - architectural style
A style popular during the regency and reign of George IV (1820-1830) and William IV (1830- 1837). It was derived from Georgian classical architecture but often used stucco in place of stone or blick. Some of the finest examples were introduced to London by John Nash, including Regent Street and Regent's Park (Francis, 1952).
Relict feature(s)
Townscape features belonging to a previous morphological period, possibly even pre-urban (Golachowski and Szulc, 1963; Szulc, 1972; Beresford, 1988) or earlier urban period (Conzen, 1958).
Replacement - Conzenian terminology
The rebuilding or redevelopment of individual buildings, usually the plot dominants. replacement does not include change that involves the amalgamation or subdivision of plots, but only the substitution of the block plan of one building for another (Conzen, 1960, p. 69). SEE: building replacement
Replat
The replat, or resubdivision, of an existing plat implements a new lot (plot) pattern, almost invariably at a higher density than before (M.P. Conzen, 1990, p. 167 n. 4).
Repletion - Conzenian terminology
The gradual intensification of building density in an existing plot pattern. These secondary buildings can be additional plot dominants on derivative plots (alongside the existing back lane). Alternatively, repletion takes the form of new plot accessories which develop with the socio-economic requirements of the occupiers through time. Repletion occurs in all types of plan unit as the redevelopment cycle progresses. Conzen (1960, pp. 59, 66 et seq.) illustrates this for the medieval town, and Koter (1990) the modern town centre. SEE: building cycle, burgage cycle, plot cycleand SEE: redevelopment cycle residential repletion is "the colonisation of a large residential plot by dwelling-houses on derivative plots either in the form of a conforming repletive layout or by piecemeal individual repletion. Retention of the antecedent plot dominant on its residual parent plot usually produces architectural incongruence" (Conzen, 1969, p. 130). Residential repletion is one form ofsecond-cycle development and is particularly common in the post-WWII period as the socio-economic requirements of society changed, lessening the need for large houses with large gardens. The effects of piecemeal repletion and redevelopment have been particularly marked in south-east England (Whitehand, 1988, 1990; Jones, 199), but are a nationwide phenomenon (Booth, 1989; Jones et al., 1988; Pompa, 1988; Whitehand and Larkham, 1990). Consequences for the character of the townscape owing to architectural incongruence and increasing residential densities can be severe (Whitehand, 1990).
Repletive absorption - Conzenian terminology
"Transgression of plot boundaries and absorption of adjoining plots by an intensified and growing land use, accompanied by corresponding building transgression and expansion of the plot dominant" (Conzen, 1969, p. 129).
Repletive layout - Conzenian terminology
SEE: repletion
Reserved matters - planning terminology
Details not forming part of an outline planning application that require approval before development may begin. SEE: planning application/permission
Residential accretion - Conzenian terminology
The addition of dwelling houses to the edge of the built-up area. According to the fringe-belt concept, outward urban growth consists of alternating residential accretions and fringe belts. SEE: accretion
Residential development unit - Conzenian terminology
An accretionary plan unit, otherwise termed a residential integument, that is formed by the release of land for development. Both residential layouts and arterial ribbons are such units (Conzen, 1960, pp. 71-72, 85 et seq., 97 et seq.).
Residential gross density - Conzenian terminology - planning terminology
`Density' is in common use to express these concepts. "The number of houses per unit of land including the plots and all streets providing sirect access to them. The term applies to an individual plot as well as to a plan unit. In the latter case it is an average value" (Conzen, 1969, pp. 129-130). It is expressed by local planning authorities as a number of houses, or number of habitable rooms, per unit area. The definition of a `habitable room' is not consistently applied, and usage varied from one authority to another. In most cases, a habitable room includes bedrooms, reception rooms, dining/breakfast rooms and studies, but not hallways, kitchens, bathrooms or storage spaces (City of Birmingham, 1987, p. 6). Density is used extensively by local planning authorities as a measure to ensure good standards of design and layout. Lower than average densities are favoured in situations where the site contains natural features, such as trees; the existing residential density is low such that new development should be of a similar character; access to the site is a problem; or where public amenity space is required. Conversely, higher desnities would be required where the site is close to a town centre; in an area where the scale of development justifies higher densities for reasons of civic design; in areas where dwellings for small households are acceptable; or in areas where mixed housing types are preferred. Areas of special townscape value, such as conservation areas, frequently have density controls included in any formalised scheme of management. These values will be stated in the local plan or other policy documents (eg City of Birmingham, 1987, pp. 4-6; London Borough of Hillingdon, 1981a, pp. 10-11, 1981b, pp. 2-8).
Residential ribbon - Conzenian terminology
SEE: arterial ribbon; ribbon development
Residential street - Conzenian terminology - planning terminology - street type
A street accommodating traffic to and from adjoining residential plots only (Conzen, 1969, p. 130) (Ger. Wohnstrasse). In planning usage, this term has a meaning allied to residential land use rather than to the traffic flow pattern.
Residenz - Ger. building type
Principal residence of an absolutist ruler; especially German/central European. Often originally fortified castles; many later remodelled as palaces, some with administrative features and functions.
Residenzstdt - settlement type
(Ger.) A town, or particular plan unit therein, in which the principal residence of an absolutist ruler was set. Such towns were dominated by government or court functions, which demanded construction of new towns or districts despite generally stagnant urban populations. The main model for such residenzstdte was Versailles (1670s) (Sutcliffe, 1981, p. 10). Examples are most often found in Germanic central Europe: Charlottenburg (Berlin) (Ribbe, 1980); Coemensstadt (outside Koblenz, built for Coemen, Prince Elector of the Palatinate) (von der Dollen, 1979) or newly-built capitals such as Mannheim and Karlsruhe.
Retrogressive method - method of analysis
A research procedure entailing working backward in time frim surviving features (Whitehand [Ed.], 1981, p. 13). Contrast with developmental method.
Ribbon development
The extension of urban development along an existing arterial road. This is a particular characteristic of urban growth in Britain from the mid-C19th to the inter-war period. Pressure from planners and rural conservationists against this sprawl led to the Ribbon Development Act, 1935, which prevented any worsening of the effects of rural degredation, decentralisation of homes and traffic congestion. Solutions to the problem were not offered until the reorganisation of local planning in 1947 (Conzen, 1960, pp. 44, 69-70; Hall, 1983, pp. 30-41). SEE: arterial ribbon
Ringstrasse - street type
(Ger.) The extra-mural development of a planned ring of roads in European cities, usually between the late C18th and the late C19th, in the zone where corporate regulation had prevented building encroaching on urban fortifications. Ringstrasse are often accompanied by extensively-landscaped public space and occasional institutional and recreational buildings. In the C20th, these areas have been further developed for dual carriageways, inner ring roads, and urban tramways.
Ring road - street type
Annular road around an urban area, to prevent through traffic congesting the urban core. Birmingham has a network of 3: inner, middle and outer ring roads. Most U.K. ring roads date from the post-WWII period, when concern over traffic impacts was rising.
Roman town - settlement type
The Roman colonisation of Britain left many elements of urban form that have been incorporated into modern town plans. Colonia towns such as Gloucester, York, Lincoln and Colchester were Roman legionary fortresses surrounded by estate farms. Municium towns such as Verulanium (St. Albans) and possibly Londinium (London) were roughly equivalent to a borough. Civitas capital towns with a typical `- chester' place-name suffix were the highest order settlements in Roman Britain. They form the equivalent of county towns with a defensive role, market function, basilica, theatre etc. (Wacher, 1973).
Row - Conzenian terminology
A line of plot dominants occupying the full street frontage but of diverse architectural design. This form of closed building development is typical of the kernels of historic towns (Conzen, 1960, p. 32). Contrast with row houses.
Row houses
(1)Applied in medieval contexts: a rare survival is modified form is the Rows in Chester (Chester Archaeological Society, 1984).
(2)North American term for terraced housing.
Sale plan - data source
Document issued by land agents for the sale of property in the late C19th and early C20th: a useful urban data source.
Second-cycle development
Repletion of development within an area that has undergone virtually complete first-cycle development. In the residential townscape, this usually takes the form of single or multiple plot redevelopment, and the addition, or infill, of new dwellings by plot truncation or mediation (Pompa, 1988, pp. 79-80; Jones, 1990).
Semi-detached house - building type
One of two houses attached by a party wall but separated from other buildings. These became popular during the Victorian period when the suburban villa residence became a feature of lower-middle class housing and gave the impression of a large detached dwelling (Slater, 1978). Popularity peaked in the inter-war period when the expansion of British cities, both by local authorities and speculative developers, predominantly used universal plan semi-detached designs (Edwards, 1981, chap. 3; Bournville Village Trust, 1941, p. 38). These are typified by the Metroland developments of north-west London (Jackson, 1973).
Set-back - U.S. planning terminology
U.S. zoning regulations controlling permitted amounts of floorspace, whereby the upper floors of tall buildings are set back behind the building line of the ground floor. This admits more daylight to street level, and avoids canyon-like streets (Moseley, 1986).
Skyscraper - building type
SEE: steel-framed building
Slum
Term apparently of early C19th origin. "The term slum is a loose definition of the environs and behaviour of the poor"; a persistent Victorian view inextricably linking living conditions and behaviour, lacking in validity (Ward, 1976). In physical terms, slum implies housing of poor quality, either through neglect or inferior original design. See Gaskell (1990). Often, by modern standards, unfit for human habitation. Resulted in slum clearance programmes in many British cities, most usually in the post-WWII period; inhabitants were usually rehoused in high-rise block housing (see Esher, 1981).
Sozialwohnungen - Ger. building type
SEE: almshouse
Special type - Caniggian terminology
In Caniggian analysis, all building types other than dwellings are special types of any urban tissue (Samuels, 1982, p. 3).
Speculative building
Building constructed for lease or resale by a developer with the expectation of profit. The initiator of development is the developer, who does not occupy the building. Therefore, this is the opposite of bespoke development.
Speculative developer/speculator - agent of change
Developer who undertakes development wholly for profit by lease or resale; not carrying out development on the instructions of clients. Eg volume housebuilders are speculative developers.
Square
SEE: place In Britain, squares are common in formal Georgian layouts, often originating in the development of large urban estates of the aristocracy, particularly in London.
Steel-frame building - building type
The first of these were textile warehouses but, as construction technology advanced, the method was soon adopted by the Chicago school of architects, which was active in the last quarter of the C19th. These structures, soon named skyscrapers, were characterised by a load-bearing steel skeleton frame and a design that anticipated the Modern style. The majority of early examples can be found in Chicago, developed following the fire of 1871 (Lampugani, 1986, pp. 64-68; Bonshek, 1988).
Street furniture
Term used to embrace all types of small structures found in streets: eg lamp standards, bus shelters, benches, litter baskets, telephone kiosks, etc.
Street - Conzenian terminology - street type
A town or village road that has more or less closed building development along its length. It is a space (street-space), is bounded by street lines and is provided either for through traffic - a major traffic street - or for access to parts of a plot - an occupation street - or a solely residential street. It is a plan- element.
Street block - Conzenian terminology
A group of plots bounded by street lines (Conzen, 1960, p. 5).
Street density - Conzenian terminology
"The average street length per unit of urban land" (Conzen, 1969, p. 130).
Street line - Conzenian terminology
The line dividing street-space from adjoining street blocks (Conzen, 1960, p. 5).
Street market
Street used, and often widened, to accommodate market functions: SEE: market place
Street system - Conzenian terminology
The arrangement of streets within the town plan, of which it is an element complex (Conzen, 1960, p. 5).
Strip-plot - Conzenian terminology
An elongated plot with one of its shorter boundaries forming the frontage with the street. An occupation road or back lane often provides access to the plot tail. The layout of burgages is a typical form of strip plot. Subdivision (mediation) of plots heightens this characteristic, as the high rental value of street frontages is maximised (Conzen, 1960, p. 28).
Subdivision - fabric change
Plots may be divided horizontally or vertically: SEE: plot cycle See Shiramizu and Matsumoto (1986).
Subdivider - agent of change
Agent of change involved in plot subdivision: term coined by Baerwald (1981). In the British context, although not so process-specific, the term developer is preferred.
Suburb/suburban
SEE: suburbium The district that is near to, but beyond, the walls of a city; confines, outskirts (OED). There is rarely an identifiable boundary between city and suburb. In Europe, the term tends to include far more urban area than in the U.S. Particularly with medieval suburban development, different types may be differentiated, including extra-mural and bridge-head suburbs (Keene, 1976). "In the C17th the suburbs were sometimes equated with the prostitutes' quarters of cities ... by 1817 ... `suburban' was used to describe the `inferior manners and narrowness of view' then attributed to residents of the suburbs. Thereafter, with the onset of the industrial revolution and the later development of new methods of mass transportation, the meaning of `suburban' appears to have evolved towards its current use and connotation of middle-class lifestyles" (Gray and Duncan, 1978, p. 297).
Suburbia - settlement type
SEE: Metroland a particular type of suburbia, and semi-detached housing, a house type characteristic of suburbia.
Suburbium
Medieval Latin, from Lat. `sub urbe'. An unwalled, non-agricultural integument outside the fortification of the pre-urban nucleus (Lat. `urbe'). This early stage of medieval development most often forms the kernel of historic towns (Conzen, 1960, p. 22). Its original land uses would have been supplementary to the nucleus and included residential, commercial and market functions. The formerly open suburbium is often, at some point, enclosed by walls that join it to the already fortified core (see Ennen, 1953, pp. 121 ff.). The medieval Latin sense is "settlement below or near the fortified place or castle": see Conzen (1988, pp. 263 ff.) for the example of Ludlow.
Superstore - building type
There is no official definition of superstore: the term is colloquially used to denote a large supermarket. It should have a minimum of 25,000 sq. ft. of retail florspace on a single level, offering food and non-food items of a self-service basis and having their own car-parks. Owing to the extensive nature of this shop type, it is most commonly found in edge- and out-of-town locations.
Tail-end plot - Conzenian terminology
A derivative plot occupying the tail of a parent plot, being the result of plot truncation (Conzen, 1969, p. 56).
Tandem development - planning terminology
New development behind existing building, for which access may only be obtained from the parent plot's street frontage.
Tenement
(1)A unit of landholding (Lat. tenementum).
(2)building type An industrial block of flats or apartments, usually of up to three storeys, normally aligned parallel to the street. Access to the flats is obtained by a series of staircases, each common to several flats. The tenement is the most common dwelling type in large industrial cities in Europe, outside England (Worsdall, 1979).
Tenement block - building type
SEE: tenement(definition [2]).
Terrace
(1)building type See Muthesius (1982). A continuous line of three or more dwellings of unified architectural design (Conzen, 1960, p. 63). Although a characteristic of most morphological periods, notably in Georgian Bath, Edinburgh and Dublin, this form of development was particularly popular in Britain from the mid C19th. Standards of working-class terrace housing were improved as housing standards came within the control of public health and housing/planning regulation. The majority were through-terraces with two rooms on both ground and first floors, with a kitchen/scullery at the rear and a small garden beyond. In inner city areas, especially in the northern industrial towns, back-to-back terraced housing was common: in other regions, blind-backs and tunnel-backs are common terrace types (Burnett, 1978, pp. 77-78; Muthesius, 1982). The terraced house was less favoured in the inter-war period as semi-detached dwellings on green-field sites became the typical working- and middle-class housing type. Victorian and Edwardian terraced housing thus usually forms the inner suburbs of British towns.
(2) architectural term A level space supported by a wall, eg in a park or extended from a building, often used as a promenade.
Timber-framed building - building type
Building with a main structure of timber, making up a series of frames (cross, wall, roof and floor), jointed together. Early urban examples rarely survive; examples from the C15th onwards are more common. Small urban plots (commonly subdivided burgages) and high land values led to modifications of rural timber-framed house plans, giving taller buildings commonly with oversailing upper stories (known as `jetties'). Buildings using this type of construction usually appear as `half-timbered' (also known as `black- and-white' from their usual, albeit probably Victorian, appearance). They are commonly referred to as Tudor, although by no means all examples date from this period. C20th `black-and-white' buildings are rarely structurally timber-framed; the timber and infilling is solely decorative: these buildings may erroneously be termed half-timbered, but are better known by the style name neo-Tudor.
Tipo portante - Caniggian terminology
Italian, `leading type'. Concept developed by Caniggia, where there is optimum relationship between the building type and the urban fabric at a given period and location, as both are constructed simultaneously. This occurs only in extensions to settlements developed during periods of urban expansion. At any given period, the leading type is thus found on the expanding fringes, while earlier buildings will have been modified to incproprate features of the new leading type. See Samuels (1982, 1990).
Town - settlement type
Smaller urban area; but `town' is undefined as to exact size or function. In the U.S. `city' is usually preferred for most settlements above c. 5,000 population: `towns' are rare. Note that there is considerable debate over what constitutes a medieval `town' (not unrelated to the debate on boroughs). The C19th emphasis on market law or municipal law as the essence of a medieval town has largely been abandoned in favour of a functionalist approach (Clarke and Simms, 1985, pp. 674-676; Schledermann, 1971).
Town house - building type
Usually refers to large urban houses built for the nobility and/or wealthy mercantile classes, as urban residences usually subordinate to their main residence on a rural estate. Ger. Adelshfe. C20th usage, eg by estate agents, refers to terraced property commonly of 3 or 4 storeys; post- WWII examples usually have a garage making up the ground floor.
Town plan - Conzenian terminology
The arrangement of streets, plots and buildings forming the topographical arrangement of the built urban environment. Conzen (1960, p. 4) uses "all features of the built-up area shown on the 1:2,500 Ordnance Survey plans" as these give morphological detail to a level by which aspects of building fabric and of land use may be studied: including the three element complexes.
Townscape
"The physiognomy of a town or the urban landscape, being the combination of three systematic form complexes, ie town plan, building fabric and land use" (Conzen, 1969, p. 131), "the visual appearance of a town" (OED). Many geographers comprehensively examine a town's scenery and its evolution into its modern form (eg Smailes, 1955). Many accounts are merely descriptive, often chronological, often failing to make any cogent point (Johns, 1965; Burke, 1971, 1976). The usual architectural approach tends to view each element of a townscape more as an individual work of artistic merit, and seems to claim that townscaping is an applied art (Cullen, 1961). Sharp, unusually and early for a planner, also makes this point (Sharp, 1968). Probably best defined in non-technical terms as "a wide scenic view of a town or parts of a town, with common characteristics of design" (Johns, 1965, p. 10).
Townscape cell - Conzenian terminology
The smallest of a hierarchy of unitary areas within a town, often a plot or a small group of plots (SEE: morphotope.
Townscape region
SEE: morphological region
Transformative processes - Conzenian terminology
A sequence of activities whereby change in brought about to existing urban forms (contrast with additive processes).
Truncation
SEE: plot truncation
Tunnel-back dwellings - building type
Terraced houses, most often of the late-Victorian or Edwardian periods, in which external access to the rear of the dwellings is obtained through passageways located at intervals on the street frontage. Also a variant of the earlier court housing where the courts were completely enclosed by houses and were accessible only through narrow passageways, called tunnels (Muthesius, 1982, p. 108; See Brunskill, 1978, pp. 112-113).
Tudor - architectural style
Common term for architecture popular in the Tudor period, refers almost exclusively to timber- framed buildings, although there are good examples of Tudor brickwork.
Universal plan - building type
Dwelling layout derived from a reduced scale and simplification of the Georgian terraced house. "The usual plan of the small, three-bedroomed house is more or less the same throughout the whole country and for that reason is known to architects as the `universal plan' (Bournville Village Trust, 1941, p. 38).
Urban conservation
Conservation/preservation of the character and appearance of urban areas. In Britain, this has been formalised in the post-WWII period by the listing of buildings (SEE: Listed building and, since the 1967 Civic Amenities Act, by the designation of conservation areas. In the U.S., these are paralleled by `historic districts' and `heritage sites'. `Conservation' seems to imply a more active, interventionist, role of management than does `preservation', particularly in British C20th planning terminology.
Urban fallow - Conzenian terminology
Land, within the urban fabric, that is temporarily disused owing to socio-economic devaluation. This concept was developed by Conzen from the Sozialbrache (social fallow) of Hartke (1953). It forms part of the burgage, plot and redevelopment cycles, when land has been cleared but no new development, initiated by socio-economic revaluation, has begun (Conzen, 1960, p. 94).
Urban fortifications
The walls, towers, bastions, ditches, moats and glacis of the fortified town (see Barley, 1976); includes urban castles, although in many cases the primary function of the castle was not the protection of the town itself. Such fortifications usually ringed the kernel of the town, forming a barrier to development; a fixation line; but, when cleared (often in the C18th-C19th in Europe) afforded an opportunity for certain types of development, including ringstrasse.
Urban fringe belt - Conzenian terminology
SEE: fringe belt
Urban landscape
Term more usually used in scholarly writing (eg Whitehand [Ed.], 1981; Whitehand, 1988a). Virtually synonymous with townscape.
Urban-rural fringe
Zone containing both urban and rural land uses at the periphery of the built-up area. Also referred to as `rural-urban fringe'.
Urban tissue - Caniggian terminology
In Caniggian analysis, the urban tissue is the ensemble of aggregated buildings, spaces and access routes (Samuels, 1982, p. 3).
Vernacular - architectural style
(1)`Of local origin' - the idea that certain building styles and materials are characteristic of particular regions. Pseudo-vernacular: "... the use of traditional materials and stylistic features in inappropriate locations" (Bridger, undated, p. 87). Neo-vernacular: "implies a new use or arrangement of traditional styles, interposed with new forms of construction" (Ibid.). Some studies have used neo- and pseudo-vernacular without differentiation.
(2)A building not expressly architect-designed: see Brunskill (1978).
Urbs - settlement type
SEE: pre-urban nucleus A seigneurially-organised, fortified settlement core, that may have been an episcopal civitas, a religious institution or a secular fortress (von der Dollen, 1990, pp. 322- 323).
Victorian - architectural style
Styles of the reign of Victoria (1937-1901), sometimes extended into the Edwardian period. Usually divided into three periods: early Victorian (1837 - c. 1855), characterised by Classical styles, mid- or High-Victorian (c. 1855 - c. 1875), characterised by neo-Gothic, and late Victorian (c. 1875 to the turn of the century), characterised by an increasing eclecticism in the use of historicist stylistic elements (Dixon and Muthesius, 1978, pp. 17-28).
Villa - building type
Slater (1978) notes the changing use of `villa' from large' detached, upper-class mansions in extensive grounds (C18th to early C19th) to suburban terraced housing (late C19th, persisting today in estate agents' usage). In studies of urban form, the former use is preferred. In North American usage, `villa' seems synonymous with detached house (Holdsworth, 1986). SEE: ornamental villa
Villae mercatoriae - settlement type
`Market villages': medieval grant of market rights to a village, ie not a borough. Quite common in England, but rare in Wales, Scotland and Ireland (Graham, 1988, pp. 46-47). A step towards borough, and therefore urban, status.
Villa suburb - settlement type
Areas of (usually) Victorian and Edwardian villas clustered to give an upper - upper-middle class suburb. Examples include Edgbaston, Birmingham (Cannadine, 1980) and Victoria Park, Manchester (Spiers, 1976). Ger. Villenkolonien, eg. Grunewald, Berlin.
Vorstadt (Ger.) - settlement type
A separately-administered suburb established in central European cities between the C13th and C16th, often dominated by particular craft guilds and production. See von der Dollen (1990). Vorstadt suburbs are to be distinguished from pre-urban settlement and the Neustadt. For Vorstdte suburbs see Blaschke, 1970; Czok, 1979 and Kuhn, 1971).
Ward
(1)SEE: castle the `bailey' of a motte and bailey castle.
(2)Urban administrative division; local electoral district.
Wic
Open trading area in the North/Baltic Sea area, common in the C8th to C10th (Clarke and Simms, 1985).