Noos. Not Only One Solution. An Urban Design Process

The aims of the paper are 1) to illustrate the activities of urban design by defining and describing a process and 2) to discuss the roles of urban designers within the process. Urban design, according to the several definitions provided or collected by urban design theorists, such as Clarence Stein, Kevin Lynch, Francis Tibbalds, Jonathan Barnett, and Ali Madanipour, can be described through five characters. 1. UD is interested in the (urban) form made, in the process to make it, and the management of what has been made. 2. UD is applied to different scales and different portions of urban environments. 3. UD is part of the processes of the production of space. 4. UD involves different skills and technical knowledge. 5. UD favours an objective-rational process rather than an expressivesubjective one. Starting from these five points the paper emphasizes the role of process in the urban design activity as a way of managing the internal dynamics of a projects. Process is considered a mean to help designers in their role of project manager. A role which is to plan, to control, and to co-ordinate a project from conception to completion. The paper proposes an organized 9-step process: Instances- Knowledge-Summary-Options-Dialogues-Master Plan- Communication-Details-Implementation. The process is called NOOS which stands for Not Only One Solution. The formula reiterates that urban design, like other design activities, not only permits but demands, that different answers and different solutions can be given to a (urban or development) problem . The proposal and the organization of a design process is not, therefore, an attempt to shape a deterministic process which would lead, given certain inputs, to only one output. To use a process means to employ a structure, a route strategy, which helps the designer to move towards the target, not necessarily to get there early. NOOS, is also an ancient Greek word that means reason, mind, intelligence, wisdom, but also, “project” and “plan”, in the meaning of intention. The paper also discuss two roles of urban designers. The first is that of “director of spatial rules” and the second is that of “broker (and promoter) of design processes”. References: J.Barnett, 1982, An introduction to urban design, New York; K.Lynch, 1981, A Theory of Good City Form, Cambridge; A.Manadipour, 1996, Design of Urban Space, New York; F.Tibbalds, 1988, “Mind the Gap” in The Planner; C.Stein, 1955, Unpublished notes on urban design, Un. of Pennsylvania; J.Lang, 2005, Urban Design. A Typology of Procedures and Products, Amsterdam; M.Carmona, et al., 2003, Public Places. Urban Spaces. The dimensions of Urban Design, Oxford