Evolution

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A conurbation is the amalgamation of land supporting a growing city/cities joined through a combined regional economy and character. Geddes describes it as industrial towns and cities uniting into vast city regions called conurbations which the broadest surveys are needed to realize (Cities in Evolution 25) Conurbations express the present day evolution of our cities where they begin overflowing or absorbing into the adjacent villages, towns and cities, giving it more land, resources and people to support itself. The amalgamation forms a whole whose character developed as a response to the regional environment supporting the city and the activities arising from those conditions. A conurbation is polycentric urban agglomeration where ideally transportation has also developed to link areas creating a singular economic region. Examples include Greater London and the space between Liverpool and Manchester forming to create Lancaston, in the New York-Boston area to which Geddes had even speculated that the whole American Atlantic Coast would sprawl together to become one vast conurbation. (Cities in Evolution 49) A conurbation can be contrasted by a megalopolis where the urban centers are close but not physically contiguous and the transportation and economic and labor markets are still separated.

Place

An area is defined by its geography, history and/or culture. The nature of the land in topographical and mineral terms at the most basic level, the scope and layout of constructed cities and dwellings, and borders—political, linguistic, religious or of property—reflexively define its inhabitants and the work that takes place. For instance an iron-rich terrain will be developed very differently economically in comparison to fertile farmland. Consequentially, agricultural societies and mining societies which result may have different cultural norms and priorities, with one perhaps favoring climate over industrialization.

Aside from natural resources, transportation and infrastructure are hugely influenced by topographical features with an inevitable effect on the size to which a city can grow and trade. On a smaller scale, the size and shape of a city can have very profound influences on the character of a city, such as the difference between a grid-iron layout and an irregular layout—uniformity can make a city more intuitively understandable and efficient, but raises questions about traffic flow and livability.

Asserting that the forces of evolution are real and extend beyond Biology to affect every aspect of the city, Geddes concludes that a strict urban plan cannot adapt to the constant changes brought about by time: fluxes in migration, distribution of resources and advances in technology cause inevitable unpredictability. Evolution does not differentiate between beneficial and detrimental changes however, so Geddes called for a method to curate these changes and encourage the good, while discouraging the bad.

In order to bring about a more “Eutopian” city, its organization must bring out the fullest refinement of the Work, Folk and Place. Town planning should not blindly beautify or renovate but rather praise and develop the unique character of the location, its people and the activities they engage in.

Conservative surgery prioritizes reconstruction over demolition, creating civic centers and cultural institutions whilst preserving places of significant cultural or historical importance. Only the most unsanitary or dilapidated buildings beyond repair should be demolished. The resulting voids can be used to lower population density in congested slums, creating natural open spaces for leisure or agriculture, providing courtyards for those who would have no breathing room otherwise.

Conservative surgery requires an enlightened, holistic approach—such as considering topography, climate and history—to fully understand the nature of the city and its inhabitants, so that the most minimal changes have the greatest impact. Without specifying particular architectural styles or cultural norms, he sought to preserve human life and happiness of all citizens, regardless of their status, while encouraging local pride.

Evolution

Charles Darwin developed the concepts of ’natural selection’ and competition driving small mutations and adaptations towards greater diversity of life, which gradually replaced previous theories as scientific consensus.

Evolution was a major inspiration to Geddes, in terms of its constant self-correcting randomness and resulting differentiation.

However while Geddes agreed that evolution was unpredictable, he believed in the positivist ideal of advancing the human condition, thus the natural processes of evolution should be curated — positive changes encouraged and negative changes discouraged

Folk

Work

According to Geddes, Man differs from plants and animals through his ability to change the environment consciously with his own labor, according to his needs. Natural order is replaced by a synthetic order that requires deliberate effort in its realization and maintenance, and should be comprehensive in its totality. What psychologists and sociologists see in individuals and groups is applicable to cities, because the history of each generation builds on the next, such that the culture of any group of people is an ever-changing development, full of idiosyncrasies, divergent trends and unique memes.

People united by trade or geography form a synergistic bond that reveals itself in their art, language and cultural norms. This common thread is not to be discouraged but rather developed and emphasized as a source of collective pride and identity.

The fact that cities continue to change beyond this point and grow beyond their borders does not hinder its development, instead it recreates it as a process of continual evolution and variation, thus adding to the richness of the collective consciousness.

Much as the culture is affected by the economic activity which takes places within its borders (Work), and the nature of the inhabited space (Place), culture determines how the economic activity is enacted and how the land is treated or perceived by its people.

The work undertaken by inhabitants defines their routines, their interactions with each other, and the innovations they potentially develop. Economic links facilitate cultural exchanges, political alliances and human migration (Folk). Specific labor activities also can exploit the terrain, and shape the layout of a city, for instance fishing near the sea or creating resort districts near a beach. This can have negative consequences in terms of pollution or eminent domain resulting in emigration.

As a case study: China’s abundance of kaolin clays (Place) and love for hot teas (Folk) lead to a long and sophisticated history of manufacturing fine porcelain (Work), which arguably discouraged the same sophisticated manipulation of glass, allowing Europeans to advance beyond them with their use of optics (and as a result, creating eyewear and telescopes—extending a persons’ working life, and allowing for space and sea discoveries respectively).

An antiquated technological mindset reliant on industrial machinery, exploiting mineral resources, and congesting the air with smoke and smog.

Various disciplines working in synch to comprehensively appropriate resources using newer technologies, and more efficient production (e.g. using electricity, instead of coal) combined with natural beauty (e.g. an attractive waterfall producing hydroelectric power).

Functioning, organic combination of refinement

Inhabited Space

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Thinking Machines

Patrick Geddes was on a field expedition in Mexico when we has temporarily blinded he created a system for arranging and expressing his thoughts and their relationships tactility by folding paper into squares. Inspired by the panes of a window each one represents the variables of a problem and their adjacencies determined their relationships and interdependencies. He utilized these thinking machines to scientifically analyze the qualitative spectrum of human experience by dividing it into a matrix of mutually beneficial relationships. Geddes holistic evolution includes the individual the society and the environment, as encapsulated by his 9 square grid of place work folk which describes the reciprocal relationships of its components which implies that the construction of the environment is determined by the nature of its occupants and the mode of social organization and institutions within it. The inhabitants and their traits are reflected in their environment, which is being continuously shaped by the collectives’ activities. The spirit of the city and the personality of its occupants co-evolve. This is a recurring cycle where components grow, stagnate and decay. The process of change is caused by active and passive aspects, either man consciously guiding his daily life and remaking place or man shaped by place and work. The Notion of Life is Geddes most complex matrix and it is a graphic summary of his views on human life as broken down into two intertwining formulas of town-city and act-deed. According to Welter, the central four terms of the diagram; town school, cloister, and city in deed, represent the town city formula, which comprises of the four steps of transforming a town into a city. The outer frame comprises of another four terms; acts, facts, thought and deeds, constitute the act deed formula which comprises four steps by which human lives are raised to higher levels of conscious existence. This diagram puts forward a theory of human interaction with the environment; it also includes Geddes’s methodology for the improvement of the human condition. The results were holistic trajectories by which societies, individuals and activities can “evolve” whilst in reciprocal relationships with each other. Geddes was seeking a scientific method for studying unquantifiable phenomena or the relationships between phenomena, and also the understanding of them, marks him as a precursor of modern methods of systems analysis and cybernetics. (Meller 46)