Glossary

The lexicon of urbanism is one that borrows from many fields, which can present a problem. Typically one struggles to learn and maintain a vocabulary within a certain field study. However, when that field of study appropriates words form other subjects, one also has to understand the intended definition. This can lead to misunderstandings, but also create the opportunity for unique interpretations.

Thus, I will continually add terminology to the glossary to address the former, and if you experience the latter, please leave a comment below with you own interpretation of the word in question.

causation
a dependency between two variables, where one is the cause and the other the effect

correlation
Statistics. the degree to which two or more attributes or measurements on the same group of elements show a tendency to vary together.

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006

hyper-rationalist
often thought of as function over form; this is a an architect that seeks logic and rigor by solving a projects’ problems with utilitarian solutions, from which beauty will present itself

imageability
coined by Kevin Lynch in Image of a City; “is the quality of a physical object, which gives an observer a strong, vivid image.” This can refer to a monument, building, park, and city among other things. Imageability is not the same as iconography, as it pertains to one’s ability to instantly recognize an object, than the singularity and formal aspects of the object that cause recognition


incentive
something that guides someone’s decision making process, by allowing them to prioritize; incentives can be financial, political, emotional, etc. that inform one’s behavioral patterns.

infrastructural geography
coined by Abalos & Herreros; looks to describe the manner in which cities and the earth work together

lipservice
There is always a quarter called Lipservice, where a minimum of the past is preserved: usually it has an old train/tramway or double-decker bus driving through it, ringing ominous bells - domesticated versions of the Flying Dutchman’s phantom vessel. Its phone booths are either red and transplanted from London, or equipped with small Chinese roofs. Lipservice - also called Afterthought, Waterfront, Too Late, 42nd Street, simply the Village, or even Underground - is an elaborate mythic operation: it celebrates the past as only the recently conceived can. It is a machine. -Rem Koolhaas, Generic City

mapping
a representation of one’s understanding of targeted relationships in 2D (i.e. driving directions, subway maps, demographic data), 3D (i.e. topography, tallest buildings, sedimentary layers), or 4D (i.e circulation, population change, construction schedule)

megalopolis
a large urban area, generally composed of multiple cities and their surrounding areas

polis
The polis, properly speaking, is not the city-state in its physical location; it is the organization of the people as it arises out of acting and speaking together, and its true space lies between people living together for this purpose, no matter where they happen to be. …action and speech create a space between the participants which can find its proper location almost any time and anywhere. It is the space of appearance in the widest sense of the word, namely, the space where I appear to others as others appear to me, where men exist not merely like other living or inanimate things but make their appearance explicitly. …to be deprived of it means to be deprived of reality, which, humanly and politically speaking, is the same as appearance. -Hannah Arendt

superposition
a method of layering information or systems by placing one over the other