Urban code : 100 lessons for understanding the city / Anne Mikoleit, Moritz Pürckhauer.

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1 People walk the sunshine -- 2 Street vendors are positioned according to the path of the sun -- 3 Street vendors facilitate pedestrian movement -- 4 Safe surroundings increase profits -- 5 High turnover makes up for high rent -- 6 Rents rise with increasing pedestrian density -- 7 Global shops sell their wares on popular streets -- 8 Salespeople possess analytical knowledge of the district -- 9 Passersby have an intuitive knowledge of the district -- 10 Familiar chain stores are landmarks -- 11 Brand names attract people, people attract bland names -- 12 Shops attract other shops -- 13 Tourists carry bags -- 14 Shops give away bags -- 15 Street vendors complement the surrounding selection of shops -- 16 Human traffic complies with shop opening times -- 17 Street vendors reinforce fluctuations -- 18 People attract people -- 19 Places of concentration depend on places of emptiness -- 20 Cars can park in niches -- 21 Cars park on top of one another -- 22 Street vendors follow wrecking balls -- 23 Constant grids afford manifold patterns of movement -- 24 Equal grids provoke unequal blocks -- 25 Buildings outlive uses -- 26 A block consists of many buildings -- 27 Each building has at least one entrance -- 28 No entrance is the same as any other entrance -- 29 Entrances are meeting points -- 30 Entrances are hurdles -- 31 Shops attract pedestrians into the depths of the block -- 32 Each building houses a business --

33 Small, specialized shops are essential to maintaining a district's vitality -- 34 Display windows are mirrors -- 35 Pedestrians are potential buyers -- 36 Pedestrians walk on sidewalks -- 37 The sidewalk is a cellar entrance -- 38 Wares are stored in the cellar -- 39 Deliveries are limited to The early hours ot the morning -- 40 Delivery vans block the streets -- 41 Locals and tourists use the streets at different times -- 42 People walk more slowly in the afternoon -- 43 Rituals result from parallel working hours -- 44 The day today happens on the street -- 45 Workers wear work clothes -- 46 Taxi drivers live on the street -- 47 Locals have dogs -- 48 Every thirtieth pedestrian has gray hair -- 49 Old people sit on benches -- 50 Benches are found on public square -- 51 Playgrounds draw children in -- 52 Not every playground is a playground -- 53 Fathers meet fathers on play grounds -- 54 Small public squares are busier than large public squares -- 55 Crossroads are public squares -- 56 People wait at crossroads -- 57 Hot dog stands are at crossroads -- 58 Snack stands smell of food -- 59 Shops lead people -- 60 Shops are new, houses are old -- 61 Shop owners put their trash bags out on the street -- 62 A city is made up of characteristic parts -- 63 Streets were once communal space -- 64 Public squares and niches create positive outsidespaces -- 65 People sit with their back protected --

66 Sitting people observe their environment -- 67 Pedestrians lost in thought are not lost -- 68 Tourists stand still, residents pass -- 69 When people stand still, groups develop -- 70 Groups attract people -- 71 Street performers animate public spaces -- 72 Groups walk more slowly than individuals -- 73 Nightlife hotspots increase pedestian traffic -- 74 People are afraid of the dark -- 75 Many lights illuminate the night -- 76 Street cafes lie at the center of events -- 77 Subway stations thicken pedestrian traffic -- 78 Narrow streets carry many pedestians -- 79 Narrow streets carry little traffic -- 80 Cobblestones tell stories -- 81 Local streets are one-way streets -- 82 Cars drive down main roads faster than down side streets -- 83 Pedestrians walk on a red signal, if traffic is slow -- 84 Traffic jams tend to bring out aggression -- 85 Weeds reduce aggression -- 86 The counterpart to the urban everyday is the urban park -- 87 People who walk have a destination in mind -- 88 Good walkways have a good range of destinations along them -- 89 Destinations are more attractive when they invite a stay -- 90 Grocery stores are important local destinations -- 91 Grocery stores on street corners have an advantage -- 92 The livelihood of a street begins at crossroads -- 93 SoHo life begins with traffic lights -- 94 Traffic lights create traffic noise -- 95 People wait for taxis, taxis wait for people -- 96 Taxis compensate for public transportation -- 97 Subway stations are at borders -- 98 A neighborhood has borders -- 99 Through streets are borders -- 100 Fractures create friction.

Cities speak, and this little book helps us understand their language. Considering the urban landscape not from the abstract perspective of an urban planner but from the viewpoint of an attentive observer, Urban Code offers 100 "lessons--maxims, observations, and bite-size truths, followed by short essays--that teach us how to read the city. This is a users guide to the city, a primer of urban literacy, at the pedestrian level. The reader (like the observant city stroller) can move from People walk in the sunshine (lesson 1) to Street vendors are positioned according to the path of the sun (lesson 2); consider possible connections between the fact that "Locals and tourists use the streets at different times" (lesson 41) and "Tourists stand still when theyre looking at something (lesson 68); and weigh the apparent contradiction of lesson 73, "Nightlife hotspots increase pedestrian traffic" and lesson 74, "People are afraid of the dark." A lesson may seem self-evident (Grocery stores are important local destinations--of course they are!) but considered in the context of other lessons, it becomes part of a natural logic. With Urban Code, we learn what to notice if we want to understand the city. We learn to detect patterns in the relationships between people and the urban environment. Each lesson is accompanied by an icon-like image; in addition to these 100 drawings, thirty photographs of street scenes illustrate the text. The photographs are stills from films shot in the Manhattan neighborhood of SoHo; the lessons are inspired by the authors observations of SoHo, but hold true for any cityscape.