LAVUE

No presente trabalho parto dos fundamentos do Romantismo enquanto movimento artístico e do pensamento de urbanistas seus contemporâneos, procurando eventuais raízes de um sentimento anti-urbano que possam justificar parcialmente as actuais dinâmicas de dispersão urbana.

Busco-o depois em duas obras paradigmáticas da literatura romântica em Portugal ("Eurico o Presbítero" e "Viagens na Minha Terra".

A discussão final, em que procuro conciliar os distintos e, até então, atomizados corpos do trabalho com as dinâmicas actuais de ocupação do território, é organizada em torno da análise do filme "A Vila", de M. Night Shyamalan e da noção foucauldiana de "heterotopia".

O presente trabalho analisará duas colagens da autoria de Guy Debord e Asger Jorn – Guide psychogéographique de Paris e The Naked City – procurando, por um lado, utilizá-las como motivo para uma mais lata reflexão em torno da cartografia enquanto possível interface entre o discurso científico da geografia e a prática artística e, por outro, buscando uma reflexão em torno das dificuldades que se colocam ao acto de cartografar a experiência individual da cidade.

Vivacity. Public space animation as a state and as municipal action.


The word “animation” appears on occasion within the debate around an alleged crisis of both public life
and public spaces in contemporary cities, referring to the dynamics of public space use, to interventions in
public space and to the purpose of those interventions.
Given the word’s polysemy, meaning both a state (the intensity of social life and of its manifestations) and
an action (of animating, of enlivening), this piece of research assumes that public space animation is a
legitimate concern of municipalities. However, it also acknowledges that the phrase’s imprecise contours
pose an obstacle to boosting public space animation as a policy domain bringing together part of the
municipal intervention on public spaces.
Consequently, this dissertation seeks to establish the scope of municipal actions of public space
animation. To do so, it puts forward a normative conception of animated public space, given shape in a set
of indicators; the factors underlying it; and the ways urban administration and cultural and recreational
action can be deployed to promote it.

Keywords: public space; public space animation; municipalities; urban administration; cultural and
recreational action.

Este estudo apresenta o fundamental da metodologia já desenvolvida até este momento pela equipa para a valoração, em termos monetários, de algumas dimensões da Qualidade de Vida (QdV), no âmbito do projecto FCT “Custos e Benefícios, à escala local, de uma Ocupação Dispersa”. Esta valoração constitui uma peça fundamental no estudo já que se refere à componente dos benefícios que as famílias, as empresas e as instituições parecem procurar quando tomam decisões de localização.
O estudo tenta aferir a QdV a partir das preferências declaradas para obter a disponibilidade em pagar (Willingness to Pay) expressa pelos indivíduos para aceitar melhorar as suas “circunstâncias” (ou para evitar uma perda) ou o a sua disponibilidade em receber (Willingness to Accept) uma compensação para aceitar reduzir as suas “circunstâncias” (ou para prescindir de um benefício).
Dada a natureza multidimensional, complexa e dinâmica do conceito de QdV, o estudo concentra a sua atenção num conjunto de 6 atributos (com duas concretizações cada, combinados dois a dois) associáveis a pedaços urbanos abstractos. As várias combinações possíveis são reduzidas após a aplicação do “quadrado latino” e forma a gerar 16 “conjuntos urbanos tipo” (também designados de “pedaços urbanos”) a partir dos quais se tentará valorar, em termos monetários, o correspondente “benefício”.
Com este procedimento, o estudo procura dar um contributo para o desenho de políticas públicas neste domínio procurando fornecer critérios técnicos robustos de escolha, de decisão e de acção, aos decisores com responsabilidade na gestão do território local.

There is an increasing urbanization of the world population, but the city has been taking new shapes,different from traditional compact and continuous forms. In the emergent city, mobility has transformed social and spatial relations, construction is intertwined with increasingly abandoned green spaces and the urban structure is fragmented and dispersed. Such dispersion, even without many defenders among key urban theorists, is nowadays a reality, unplanned, but practised and accepted. Arguments for and against dispersion have long been confronted, remaining unchanged: for some, it means contact with nature, space and intimacy; for others, it is a simulacrum of nature, isolation and anonymity. Such subjective arguments are important in the identification of different concepts of quality of life. But there are other arguments, objective ones: land consumption, public infrastructure costs, mobility costs and housing prices. The Research Project “Costs and Benefits of Urban Dispersion on a local scale”, from which this communication derives, seeks opinion, as precise as possible, on these issues. To do so, it will consider costs and benefits. Studies seeking to quantify costs, relating mainly to the USA, analyse dispersion, the majority of times, on a regional scale. In this Project, we intend to compare costs between different “Base Land Units” of the extended city – a concept similar to that of the neighbourhood unit or of the neighbourhood itself. Our main goal is, then, to analyse and, if possible, to confront costs and benefits of different land use types. By benefits we understand quality of life, a concept that changes from opinion group to opinion group. We intend to transform this concept into an algorithm which integrates this variability, based on the current literature, similar previous studies and on the answers to a questionnaire applied to the inhabitants of Aveiro-Ílhavo and Évora (our case studies).Regarding costs, we will look at local public infrastructure (including networks, all public space and public equipments) and mobility (integrated costs per km and per user for each transport mode). Quantification of costs relating to land consumption and other environmental externalities (nature and landscape based) has to be left for a later research opportunity. Our conclusions, supported by public questionnaires, will be expressed quantitatively: an utility function to represent opinions on quality of life; an integrated cost for local infrastructure + mobility; and a methodology to relate the two functions for a variety of scenarios. This will result in the formulation of a comparative opinion, expressed in cost-benefit terms, between the various typologies of dispersed occupation and, also, between these and those of continuous occupation. To formulate an operative proposal regarding urban dispersion, it is important to understand how the market works (in terms of its agents, procedures and prices) for current dispersed occupation dynamics. This paper will go through the work undertaken so far, describing concepts and methods and presenting preliminary results when possible. It will not only focus on the Project’s general methodology, but also on methodologies specific to each Task, whenever it is thought appropriate.

Issues of public space use have become a paramount
subject of research in the recent past. While research of an
overtly operative outlook has convincingly put forward design
and management recommendations for improving the use of
public spaces, it has struggled in approaching the issue as the
scope of urban policy and planning.
This research project aims at contributing to re-placing the
problem at an urban scope. It will do so by comparing three very
different policy and planning processes which, at an urban scale,
explicitly put forward use as a main objective of public space
production, namely Lyon, Louvain-la-Neuve and Lisbon.
This research adopts an inductive approach to the subject,
framed by readings in the intersection of pragmatic sociology,
policy and economics/management studies which suggest the
explanation of policy outcomes by in-depth analyses of the
processes leading to them. However, it maintains a geographical
standpoint as it is concerned, as well, with the “spatialization of
public policies”, i.e. the spaces that are actually produced by said
processes and the dynamics of use taking place therein.

This paper presents a literature review of some of the most relevant work in the
field of urban planning on the relationship between the characteristics of public spaces and their use. The synthesis put forward focuses on the characteristics of public spaces which contribute to their intense use. The former relate to urban form and public space design and management.