Retrofitting suburbia through pre-urban patterns

Institutions: UIC Barcelona, Spain; Arizona State University, USA

Years: 2009-2010

Researchers: Julia Koschinsky, Carmen Mendoza, Pere Vall (PI)

The analysis of pre-urban patterns is an important basis for developing strategies to retrofit suburbia. Specifically, the recovery of rural grids and watercourses as the main elements of civic networks allows one to: (1) increase diversity, accessibility and nodality of the overlapping residential tissues; (2) reinforce the diffusion effect of isolated urban transformations; and (3) integrate urban retrofitting strategies with the unique characteristics of each place.