ARCHITECTURAL | Planning | 12 Questions (EASY-MODERATE)

PRINCIPLES OF PLANNING

(12 Questions, Difficulty Level: EASY to MODERATE)

by Raison John J. Bassig

Q#1: Who is the proponent of the "Broadacre City" concept, which proposed that every family should live in one acre of land, in a city complete with all necessary amenities?

(Image Courtesy of Kjell Olsen via Flickr)

a. Richard Neutra
b. Frank Lloyd Wright
c. Don Soria y Mata
d. Le Corbusier

Broadacre City was an urban development idea of Frank Lloyd Wright, presented in his 1932 book The Disappearing City, and unveiled on a 12' x 12' scale model of a hypothetical four square mile community.

(Wright inspecting Broadacre City model, January 1, 1935. Image courtesy of Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation.)

Wright proposes that each American family would be given a one acre plot of land with a community to be developed within such plot. Primary transportation is via automobile with pedestrians safely contained within the one acre plots where most of the people will reside.

Therefore, the correct answer is b. Frank Lloyd Wright.

Q#2: In the hierarchy of spaces in New Urbanism, these spaces are defined as the field on which both the building fabric and the public realm of the city unfold.
a. Corridors
b. Blocks
c. Districts
d. Neighborhoods

Corridor:
"Connector and the separator of neighborhoods and districts...xxx... an urban element characterized by its visible continuity...xxx... and provides entry to them."
(The Neighborhood, the District and the Corridor by Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk)

Blocks:
"Field on which unfolds the building fabric and the public realm of the city. A versatile, ancient instrument, the traditional block allows a mutually beneficial relationship between people and vehicles in urban space."
(The Street, the Block and the Building by Elizabeth Moule and Stefanos Polyzoides)

District:
"Urbanized area that is functionally specialized...xxx...preclude the full range of activities necessary for a complete neighborhood, they are not the rigorously single activity zones of suburbia."
(The Neighborhood, the District and the Corridor by Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk)

Neighborhood:
"Model of urbanism that is limited in area and structured around a defined center."
(The Street, the Block and the Building by Elizabeth Moule and Stefanos Polyzoides)

(The Street, the Block and the Building by Elizabeth Moule and Stefanos Polyzoides)

Therefore, the correct answer is b. Blocks.

Q#3: According to the book, "The Neighborhood Unit", the idea of organizing towns into cohesive neighborhoods is based on the natural catchment area of which community facilities?
a. Parks and Playgrounds
b. Clubhouses (e.g. Administrative Buildings)
c. Hospitals
d. Elementary Schools

The Neighborhood Unit was conceptualized by Clarence Perry in the early 1900's. One of its core principles is "Centre the school in the neighbourhood so that a child's walk to school was only about one-quarter of a mile and no more than one half mile and could be achieved without crossing a major arterial street."

(A diagram of Clarence Perry's neighbourhood unit, from the New York Regional Survey, Vol 7. 1929 via Wikipedia)

Therefore, the correct answer is d. Elementary Schools.

Q#4: Among Kevin Lynch's elements of the city, these are defined as "intensive foci from which the observer is traveling."
a. Paths
b. Nodes
c. Edges
d. Districts

Note that the keyword to the answer is FOCUS or FOCI (plural), as nodes are considered "cores".

Paths:
"Channels along which the observer customarily, occassionally, or potentially moves."

Edges:
"Linear elements not used or considered as paths by the observer. They are boundaries between two phases...xxx... lateral references rather than coordinate axes."

Districts:
"Medium-to-large sections of the city, conceived of as having two-dimensional extent, which the observer mentally enters 'inside of', and which are recognizable as having some common, identifying character."

Nodes:
"Points, the strategic SPOTS in a city into which an observer CAN ENTER, and which are the intensive FOCI to and from which he is traveling...xxx... some of these concentration nodes are the FOCUS and EPITOME of a district, over which their influence radiates and of which they stand as a SYMBOL. They may be called CORES."

Landmarks:
"Another type of point-reference, but in this case the observer DOES NOT ENTER WITHIN them, they are external."

(Chapter III - The City Image and its Elements, from Image of the City by Kevin Lynch, 1960.)

Therefore, the correct answer is b. Nodes.

Q#5: The Sector Model Theory by Homer Hoyt in 1939 suggests that zones expand outward from the city center (CBD) along railroads, highways, and other transportation arteries. Identify the correct designation of zones (see image) according to Hoyt's Key Model:

a. 2-High Class Residential; 3-Factories/Industries; 4-Low Class Residential; 5-Middle Class Residential
b. 2-Factories/Industries; 3-Middle Class Residential; 4-High Class Residential; 5-Low Class Residential
c. 2-Low Class Residential; 3-High Class Residential; 4-Industries/Factories; 5-Middle Class Residential
d. 2-Middle Class Residential; 3-Low Class Residential; 4-Factories/Industries; 5-High Class Residential

Homer Hoyt in 1939 suggested that few activities grow in the form of sectors which radiates out along the main travel links. Activities in a sector are considered to be the same throughout the sector because of the purpose/function it serves. Land use within each sector would remain the same because like attracts like.

(Image and Texts courtesy of Planning Tank)

Therefore, the correct answer is a. 2-High Class Residential; 3-Factories/Industries; 4-Low Class Residential; 5-Middle Class Residential.

Q#6: Designer of Laguna West in California.

(Photographed in 2014 by Dave Alden via North Bay Design Kit)

a. Andres Duany
b. Edwin Hall
c. Christopher Alexander
d. Peter Calthorpe

Laguna West was designed by Peter Calthorpe using New Urbanism principles. Design features in Laguna West include features such as the following:

• Pedestrian friendly neighborhoods that encourage walking
• A town center
• A nature/riparian zone
• Houses that have small front yards and driveways that are short or behind the house, use of alleyways
• Streets that are designed to create calm and encourage slow driving by creating narrower streets or putting tree planter boxes on one side of the street, to discourage high speed thoroughfare-type driving
• Each house was to have two trees—there would be 20 species of disease- and drought-resistant trees, one species to each block. This planting plan was expected eventually to provide a continuous canopy of shade

(Reference: FOCUS; A Transit-Oriented Approach to Suburbia, 1991 by Morris Newman)

Therefore, the correct answer is d. Peter Calthorpe.

Q#7: Landscape architect involved in the Master Plan of Quezon City.
a. I.P. Santos
b. Frederick Law Olmstead
c. Harry Frost
d. Louis Croft

Quezon City was declared the new capital of the Philippines on July 17, 1948. Then President Elpidio Quirino signed RA 333, establishing the permanent seat of national government from Manila to Quezon City. The Act also created the Capital City Planning Commission, tasked to produce a master plan for the new capital city. The master plan, approved in 1949, shall "guide and accomplish a coordinated, adjusted, harmonious construction and future development" of Quezon City.

Architect Juan Arellano was appointed to head the commission. He has previously teamed up with fellow architect Harry Frost, along with Alpheus Williams and Louis Croft, to produce a master plan for Quezon City (known as the Frost Plan or the Frost-Arellano Plan). It was approved in 1941, two years after the city's birth in 1939.

(The 1949 master plan for Quezon City from 'Master Plan for the New Capital City'. Image and texts by Michael Bueza via Rappler)

Therefore, the correct answer is d. Louis Croft.

Q#8: What theory postulates that around a central town, rural land assume different forms, with intensity of production declining with distance from the market?
a. Concentric Zone Theory
b. Linear City Theory
c. Ekistics
d. Location Theory

Johann Heinrich von Thunen (1983-1850), a German economist and estate owner of the early 19th century, developed a theory of agricultural location based on an econometric analysis of his estates in Mecklenburg, near Rostock in Germany. Most of the data used in explaining his theory were obtained by him through practical experience.

He attempted to construct a theoretical model of land use pattern, giving a particular arrangement of towns and villages in a situation experienced in Mecklenburg. The main aim of von Thunen’s analysis was to show how and why agricul­tural land use varies with the distance from a market.

(From Locational Theories of Agriculture)

Therefore, the correct answer is d. Location Theory.

Q#9: A geographical area of land bounded by topographic features and height of land that captures precipitation, filters, and stores water and drains water to a shared destination.
a. Wetlands
b. Swales
c. Reservoir
d. Watershed

Reservoir = natural or artificial lake/pond from a dam to store water.
Wetlands = land saturated with water w/ vegetation/aquatic plants.
Swales = marshy or moist low tract of land (landform).

Therefore, the correct answer is d. Watershed.

Q#10: The German sociologist Ferdinand Tonnies categorized social ties into two sociological types: Gemeinschaft (community) and Gesellschaft (society). Which among the following is a characteristic of the Gesellschaft concept?

1. Maintained through individuals acting in their own self-interest and the individual's achieved status and attainment of goals.
2. Individual's status is ascribed or given by birth.
3. Regulated by common mores or beliefs about the appropriate behavior and responsibility of members of the association.
4. Ties are through strong personal relationships, strong families, and relatively simple social institutions wherein indirect social control is seldom enforced due to a direct sense of loyalty an individual feels.

Gemeinschaft (COMMUNITY)	Gesellschaft (SOCIETY)
Personal	Impersonal
Informal	Formal and contractual
Intimate and familiar	Task-specific
Traditional	Utilitarian
Sentimental	Realistic
Emphasis on ascribed statuses	Emphasis on achieved statuses
Less tolerance to deviance	Greater tolerance to deviance
Holistic relationships	Segmental (partial) relationship
Long duration	Transient and fragmented
Relatively limited social change	Very evident social change
Predominance of informal social control	Greater formal social control
We-feeling	They-feeling
Typifies rural life	Typifies urban life

(From Comparison of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft)

Therefore, the correct answer is a. Maintained through individuals acting in their own self-interest and the individual's achieved status and attainment of goals.

Q#11: His "Inventory of World Resources, Human Trends and Needs" assessed the current state of world products and productive energy, suggesting how it can be turned into man's complete advantage. He is also the proponent of the "Satellite City".
a. Charles Abrams
b. Lewis Mumford
c. Buckminster Fuller
d. Edgar Chambles

The documents in this series originate with a proposal made by R. Buckminster Fuller to the International Union of Architects (I. U. A. ) at their VIIth Congress in London, England in July, 1961, launching the World Design Science Decade. He proposed then that the architectural schools around the world be encouraged by the I. U. A. to invest the next ten years in a continuing problem of how to make the total world's resources which [in 1961] serve only 40% serve 100% of humanity through competent design despite a continuing decrease of metal resources per capita.

In essence, The World Design Science Decade series of documents suggests, in great detail, ways in which world architectural schools, and specifically their students, should initiate, and assume The Design Science Decade. The total series includes many of Fuller's most prescient ideas.

(From the Buckmister Fuller Institute)

Therefore, the correct answer is c. Buckminster Fuller.

Q#12: Entire body of laws issued by the Spanish Crown for its American and Philippine possessions of its empire that regulate the social, political, and economic life in these areas including plans in high detail on every facet of creating a community, including town planning. These laws were heavily influenced by Vitruvius' De architectura and Alberti's De Re Aedificatoria.
a. Leyes de Indias
b. Mi Ultimo Adios
c. Leyes Nuevas (New Laws)
d. Laws of Burgos

(Image courtesy of the Library of Congress)

Therefore, the correct answer is a. Leyes de Indias (or Laws of the Indies).