The funnel, the sieve and the template: towards an operational urban morphology

Abstract

In response to massive housing demand in south-east England and concern for the retention of local character in new development, this paper describes an attempt to introduce the concepts of urban morphology to the design managers of a large house builder. They, like the planners controlling them, tend to focus exclusively on building detail to the neglect of streets and plots. The concepts are introduced in a simplified way in order to make them applicable with limited resources. They are used to produce a template of a local area which is modified according to local regulatory and market conditions. The results demonstrate the influence of highway standards in determining urban form and raise doubts about the utility of the street block in design procedures.