THE IMAGE OF THE CITY

KEVIN LYNCH

Lynch, K. (1960), THE IMAGE OF THE CITY,

Cambridge, Massachusetts, The MIT Pres.

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

KEVIN LYNCH
the image of the city
Like a piece of architecture
The city is a construction in space
But one of vast scale – a thing perceived over a long span of time
City design is therefore a temporal art

Nothing is experienced by itself

But always in relation to its surroundings
The sequence of events leading up to it
The meaning of past experience

Every citizen has had long associations with some part of the city
And this image is soaked in memories and meanings

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

imageability
Our perception of the city is not sustained

The city is an object perceived by millions of people of widely diverse

class and character

It is also the product of many who are constantly modifying the

structure for reasons of their own:
• traffic engineers
• town planners
• developers
• industrialists
• investors
• residents

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

legibility
The general outline may be stable for some time
BUT it is ever changing in detail

Lynch concentrates on the visual quality of the city

The apparent clarity or legibility of the cityscape

The ease with which the city’s parts can be recognised

And organised into a coherent pattern

In the process of wayfinding, the strategic link is the environmental

image of the exterior physical world that is held by an individual

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

structure and identity
An environmental image has 3 components:
• identity – identification as an entity
• structure – spatial patterns of relationship
• meaning – practical or emotional
The 3 are not truly separable but Lynch concentrates on identity and
structure as these are more easily understood and more consistently
interpreted whilst meaning is very complex and diverse
In any city there seems to be an overlap of many individual images or
public images which can be patterned together to provide an
understanding of the form and image of the city.
Lynch proposes that the contents of the city image can be classified
into 5 Types of element for purposes of analysis:
Paths edges districts nodes landmarks

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

Lynch, K. (1960), THE IMAGE OF THE CITY,
Cambridge, Massachusetts, The MIT Pres.

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

Lynch, K. (1960), THE IMAGE OF THE CITY,
Cambridge, Massachusetts, The MIT Pres.

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

Lynch, K. (1960), THE IMAGE OF THE CITY,
Cambridge, Massachusetts, The MIT Pres.

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

 Johannesburg Inner City: Google Earth Image

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4

 Hillbrow Tower

WITS

HILLBROW

BRAAMFONTEIN Ponte Tower

Joubert Park ELLIS PARK

Metro Mall Park Station

NEWTOWN

OLD JHB CBD

Carlton Centre

West gate
Johannesburg Inner City: Google Earth Image

URD400S Principles of Urban Design 4