SR 05:165 - Laserfiche WebLink

Pattern Language, written by Christopher Alexander in 1977, presents a compelling vision of community building based on innate human patterns of settlement. Alexander, who helped design, among many sites, Mudd's Restaurant in San Ramon, California, has postulated that there are universal design patterns ranging in scale from the region down to the home that emerge through subconscious human endeavors to live together, to be social. Alexander defines 253 patterns, beginning with independent regions (1) and ending with things from your life (253), with each pattern linked to other patterns in the language, and the collective patterns capable of creating unlimited forms for healthy human activity. Many of these patterns are applicable to the Bernal Property plan, addressing architectural expression, cimulation, open space configuration, landscape design and habitat restoration. Peter Katz, author of The New Urbanism, Toward an Architecture q/'Community, prepared the first treatise on this subject of New Urbanism in 1994. The book includes essays by Peter Calthorpe, Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Elizabeth Moule and Stefanos Polyzoides, as well as a number of case studies from around the United States. Summaries of essay highlights are presented below. Katz contends that New Urbanism is a reaction to sprawl development and responds to the social imperative to recall American social and urban patterns of community during the first half of the 20th Century. "The advent of the automobile and a host of other factors provided an opportunity to disperse-to go beyond the limits of one's own walking range or that of a streetcar line. The crowding, crime and disease which plagued center cities in the past offered reasons enough to leave. In the postwar era, suburbia became the lifestyle of choice for most Americans. "While this new way of living had many advantages, it also fragmented our society-separating us from friends and relatives, breaking down the bonds of community that had served our nation so well in earlier times. Despite the increasing sophistication of our physical and electronic networks (highways, telephones, television, etc), we remain today a fragmented society. Networks, alas, are no substitute for true community." (Katz) In addition, following are pertinent excerpts from essays in The New Urbanism, Toward an Architecture of Community. Peter Calthorpe promotes the following axioms of New Urbanism (pertinent to the Bernal Property) to enhance social interaction in existing communities and to help guide the development of new ones. New Urbanism is based on historical patterns of community development applied to suburban settings, either as infill in deteriorating city centers or at the edge of development. Understanding the qualities of nature in each place, expressing it in the design of communities, integrating it within our towns and respecting its balance are critical to making the human place sustainable and spiritually nourishing.