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The recent growth of geographic data science (GDS) fuelled by increasingly available open data and open source tools has influenced urban sciences across a multitude of fields. Yet there is limited application in urban morphology—a science of urban form. Although quantitative approaches to morphological research are finding momentum, existing tools for such analyses have limited scope and are predominantly implemented as plug-ins for standalone geographic information system software. This inherently restricts transparency and reproducibility of research. Simultaneously, the Python ecosystem for GDS is maturing to the point of fully supporting highly specialized morphological analysis. In this paper, we use the open source Python ecosystem in a workflow to illustrate its capabilities in a case study assessing the evolution of urban patterns over six historical periods on a sample of 42 locations. Results show a trajectory of change in the scale and structure of urban form from pre-industrial development to contemporary neighborhoods, with a peak of highest deviation during the post-World War II era of modernism, confirming previous findings. The wholly reproducible method is encapsulated in computational notebooks, illustrating how modern GDS can be applied to urban morphology research to promote open, collaborative, and transparent science, independent of proprietary or otherwise limited software.
Martin Fleischmann; Alessandra Feliciotti; William Kerr. Evolution of Urban Patterns: Urban Morphology as an Open Reproducible Data Science. Geographical Analysis 2021, 1 .
AMA StyleMartin Fleischmann, Alessandra Feliciotti, William Kerr. Evolution of Urban Patterns: Urban Morphology as an Open Reproducible Data Science. Geographical Analysis. 2021; ():1.
Chicago/Turabian StyleMartin Fleischmann; Alessandra Feliciotti; William Kerr. 2021. "Evolution of Urban Patterns: Urban Morphology as an Open Reproducible Data Science." Geographical Analysis , no. : 1.
The impact of sea-level rise on coastal towns is expected to be a major challenge, with millions of people exposed. The climate-induced risk assessment of coastal areas subject to flooding plays an essential role in planning effective measures for adaptation plans. However, in European legislation, as well as in the regional plans adopted by the member states, there is no clear reference to urban settlement, as this concept is variable and difficult to categorise from the policy perspective. This lack of knowledge makes it complicated to implement efficient adaptation plans. This research examines the presence of the issue in Portugal’s coastal settlements, the European coastal area most vulnerable to rising sea levels, using the case of seashore streets as the most exposed waterfront public urban areas. Using the morphometric classification of the urban fabric, we analyse the relationship between urban typology and legislative macro-areas aimed at providing integrated adaptation plans. The study suggests that there is only a minimal relationship between the proposed classification and the geographical zones currently identified in coastal planning policies. Such incongruence suggests the need for change, as the policy should be able to provide a response plan tailored to the specificities of urban areas.
Francesca Dal Cin; Martin Fleischmann; Ombretta Romice; João Costa. Climate Adaptation Plans in the Context of Coastal Settlements: The Case of Portugal. Sustainability 2020, 12, 8559 .
AMA StyleFrancesca Dal Cin, Martin Fleischmann, Ombretta Romice, João Costa. Climate Adaptation Plans in the Context of Coastal Settlements: The Case of Portugal. Sustainability. 2020; 12 (20):8559.
Chicago/Turabian StyleFrancesca Dal Cin; Martin Fleischmann; Ombretta Romice; João Costa. 2020. "Climate Adaptation Plans in the Context of Coastal Settlements: The Case of Portugal." Sustainability 12, no. 20: 8559.
Unprecedented urbanisation processes characterise the Great Acceleration, urging urban researchers to make sense of data analysis in support of evidence-based and large-scale decision-making. Urban morphologists are no exception since the impact of urban form on fundamental natural and social patterns (equity, prosperity and resource consumption’s efficiency) is now fully acknowledged. However, urban morphology is still far from offering a comprehensive and reliable framework for quantitative analysis. Despite remarkable progress since its emergence in the late 1950s, the discipline still exhibits significant terminological inconsistencies with regards to the definition of the fundamental components of urban form, which prevents the establishment of objective models for measuring it. In this article, we present a study of existing methods for measuring urban form, with a focus on terminological inconsistencies, and propose a systematic and comprehensive framework to classify urban form characters, where ‘urban form character’ stands for a characteristic (or feature) of one kind of urban form that distinguishes it from another kind. In particular, we introduce the Index of Elements that allows for a univocal and non-interpretive description of urban form characters. Based on such Index of Elements, we develop a systematic classification of urban form according to six categories (dimension, shape, spatial distribution, intensity, connectivity and diversity) and three conceptual scales (small, medium, large) based on two definitions of scale (extent and grain). This framework is then applied to identify and organise the urban form characters adopted in available literature to date. The resulting classification of urban form characters reveals clear gaps in existing research, in particular, in relation to the spatial distribution and diversity characters. The proposed framework reduces the current inconsistencies of urban morphology research, paving the way to enhanced methods of urban form systematic and quantitative analysis at a global scale.
Martin Fleischmann; Ombretta Romice; Sergio Porta. Measuring urban form: Overcoming terminological inconsistencies for a quantitative and comprehensive morphologic analysis of cities. Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science 2020, 1 .
AMA StyleMartin Fleischmann, Ombretta Romice, Sergio Porta. Measuring urban form: Overcoming terminological inconsistencies for a quantitative and comprehensive morphologic analysis of cities. Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science. 2020; ():1.
Chicago/Turabian StyleMartin Fleischmann; Ombretta Romice; Sergio Porta. 2020. "Measuring urban form: Overcoming terminological inconsistencies for a quantitative and comprehensive morphologic analysis of cities." Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science , no. : 1.
Urban Morphometrics (UMM) is an expanding area of urban studies that aims at representing and measuring objectively the physical form of cities to support evidence-based research. An essential step in its development is the identification of a suitable spatial unit of analysis, where suitability is determined by its degree of reliability, universality, accessibility and significance in capturing essential urban form patterns. In Urban Morphology such unit is found in the plot, a fundamental component in the morphogenetic of urban settlements. However, the plot is a conceptually and analytically ambiguous concept and a kind of spatial information often unavailable or inconsistently represented across geographies, issues that limit its reliability and universality and hence its suitability for Urban Morphometric applications. This calls for alternative methods of deriving a spatial unit able to convey reliable plot-scale information, possibly comparable with that provided by plots. This paper presents Morphological Tessellation (MT), an objectively and universally applicable method that derives a spatial unit named Morphological Cell (MC) from widely available data on building footprint only and tests its informational value as proxy data in capturing plot-scale spatial properties of urban form. Using the city of Zurich (CH) as case study we compare MT to the cadastral layer on a selection of morphometric characters capturing different geometrical and configurational properties of urban form, to test the degree of informational similarity between MT and cadastral plots. Findings suggest that MT can be considered an efficient informational proxy for cadastral plots for many of the tested morphometric characters, that there are kinds of plot-scale information only plots can provide, as well as kinds only morphological tessellation can provide. Overall, there appears to be clear scope for application of MT as fundamental spatial unit of analysis in Urban Morphometrics, opening the way to large-scale urban morphometric analysis.
Martin Fleischmann; Alessandra Feliciotti; Ombretta Romice; Sergio Porta. Morphological tessellation as a way of partitioning space: Improving consistency in urban morphology at the plot scale. Computers, Environment and Urban Systems 2019, 80, 101441 .
AMA StyleMartin Fleischmann, Alessandra Feliciotti, Ombretta Romice, Sergio Porta. Morphological tessellation as a way of partitioning space: Improving consistency in urban morphology at the plot scale. Computers, Environment and Urban Systems. 2019; 80 ():101441.
Chicago/Turabian StyleMartin Fleischmann; Alessandra Feliciotti; Ombretta Romice; Sergio Porta. 2019. "Morphological tessellation as a way of partitioning space: Improving consistency in urban morphology at the plot scale." Computers, Environment and Urban Systems 80, no. : 101441.
Martin Fleischmann. momepy: Urban Morphology Measuring Toolkit. Journal of Open Source Software 2019, 4, 1807 .
AMA StyleMartin Fleischmann. momepy: Urban Morphology Measuring Toolkit. Journal of Open Source Software. 2019; 4 (43):1807.
Chicago/Turabian StyleMartin Fleischmann. 2019. "momepy: Urban Morphology Measuring Toolkit." Journal of Open Source Software 4, no. 43: 1807.