The Importance of Visual Sustainability in Urban Design Strategy

This research addresses interactions in urban environments—when defined as interaction types and used as a metric—as they provide an effective strategy for understanding the relationship between urban heterogeneity and how we are visually sustained through engagement with our surroundings. With most of us now living in cities, the importance of visual sustainability in urban design strategy should not be underestimated. Interaction type analysis is key to bridging the gap in knowledge which lies in the challenges posed by the levels of subjectivity inherent in how we see, what we see, and the difficulty in measuring visual sustainability. The aim of this study is to explore the philosophy behind how we are sustained by what we see and its relevance to urban design. By using a mixed methods approach, the research shows how a practical application of Bergson’s philosophy can be reconciled with urban design at a strategic level to establish an operational logic for understanding urban environments, one which does not require us to identify the meaning or even what it is people have looked at. The findings suggest that urban density plays less of a role than we might expect and what is more influential are the elements that hold people’s attention, in other words, levels of urban activity. The variables comparison points to the proposal that interaction types have a role to play in urban design strategy. To understand visual sustainability better we need to understand three things. Firstly, the role duration plays in the types of interaction we have with our surroundings. Secondly, how elements that we cannot see exist on every site, and are important in understanding not only existing conditions properly but the potential for development. Thirdly, that these elements that we cannot see are valid, real structures—as real as the physical structures which act as proxies for them. The main finding of this study is the suggestion that visual interaction types are the building blocks of visual sustainability when considered in the context of urban design strategy. What difference this makes depends on the level of analysis—whether student or practitioner, commercially oriented, in terms of spatial health and well-being, or at a more abstract level, in personal development and growth. But the overarching consideration is that interaction types are able to reveal where the real city lies and by real city is meant the city we pay attention to. The emphasis going forward must be on an effective implementation of urban design strategy by including interaction type because, as city dwellers, it is we who stand to benefit the most.