POWERSTRUCTURES : the urban form of regulations

Abstract

This thesis aims to explore the relationship between urban form and law, regulation and policy in the built environment. It depicts the roots, the necessity and exponential growth of regulations across the urbanized world and portrays their effects on urban design and architecture. Through several contemporary case studies, this thesis investigates the power and flux of regulation on the formation of modern cities. It focuses on the hidden mechanisms that construct or dissemble cities, setting the argument for lawmaking as an act of design. Moreover, this thesis depict the design, deployment and operation of a Tangible Regulation Platform, a physical-technological apparatus made for the distilment of regulations. The platform is set to exemplify the effects of regulations on a designated territory, allowing planners, designers, stakeholders and community members a common ground for discussion and decision making. An accessible and self-explanatory tool, this platform illustrates the relationship between urban form and regulations, offering a seamless and transparent process of regulation-based urban design. Lastly, projecting on the foreseen future of law and urbanism, this thesis proposes an alternative data and performance-based approach for the making of new regulations. Beyond excelling the processes of design under regulations, this platform and other new tools are offered to help facilitate a discussion on the way future regulations will be devised, improving both the design processes and their final outcome.