Urban morphology and the problem of the modern urban fabric: some questions for research

Abstract

For most researchers in urban morphology urban form means the form of the urban fabric. Most analyses are concerned above all with historical urban fabrics. There has been insufficient exploration of modern urban tissue. With its vast territorial expansion, the modern city has undergone radical changes. There has been a shift from a closed fabric in which the links between the different elements (plot, street, constructed space, and open space) formed a system, to an open fragmented peri-urban fabric. Autonomous, atomized elements do not relate to each other any more and their scale has changed greatly. In these morphological transformations the infrastructure of transportation has played a dominant role. New tools of analysis are needed to understand the new components of the modern urban fabric and their processes of formation.