The Ludic City: Exploring the Potential of Public SpacesThis international and illustrated work challenges current writings focussing on the problems of urban public space to present a more nuanced and dialectical conception of urban life. Detailed and extensive international urban case studies show how urban open spaces are used for play, which is defined and discussed using Caillois' four-part definition – competition, chance, simulation and vertigo. Stevens explores and analyzes these case studies according to locations where play has been observed: paths, intersections, thresholds, boundaries and props. Applicable to a wide-range of countries and city forms, The Ludic City is a fascinating and stimulating read for all who are involved or interested in the design of urban spaces. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
Chapter 1 Urban conditions and everyday life | 5 |
Chapter 2 Play and the urban realm | 26 |
Chapter 3 The social dimensions of urban space | 54 |
Chapter 4 Paths | 67 |
Chapter 5 Intersections | 99 |
Chapter 6 Boundaries | 114 |
Chapter 7 Thresholds | 152 |
Chapter 8 Props | 178 |
Fun follows form fun follows function | 196 |
| 220 | |
| 227 | |
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Common terms and phrases
actions audience Benjamin bodily boundaries Bourke Street Mall Caillois casino chance children’s city’s close Collins Street competition complex context creative critique crowd cyclists dance defined desires dialectical display distance distraction diversity doorway edge encounters engagement environment escape everyday experience explore exposure Figure Flinders Street footpath forms of play fountain frames freedom front function Gehl Gilloch Goffman highlights instrumental interactions intersection involvement landscape Lefebvre 1991b Lefebvre’s leisure liminal Love Parade Lynch meanings Melbourne Melbourne’s Moomba movement moving needs non-instrumental one’s opportunities parade passive path pedestrian people’s perception physical play activities playful behavior possible potential props public realm Queensbridge risk role sense sensory settings Situationists skateboarders skaters social practices social relations Southbank Promenade spatial spontaneous statues steps stimulate strangers street furniture street performers structure suggests Swanston Walk symbolic tension Three Businessmen thresholds transgressive Unitary urbanism urban design urban public space urban space users vertigo