Finding the plot : a plot-based housing development model applied to physical regeneration in Glasgow

  • Gordon Barbour

Student thesis: Doctoral Thesis

Abstract

Urban change, and the failure of conventional, post-war planning and development in Glasgow has left a legacy of vacant and derelict land in the city. This represents an underutilised asset that can be brought back into use as a public resource, contributing to the city's regeneration, and helping to slow the rate of population loss to the suburbs. Access to this land resource, primarily for housebuilding, can be assisted by the adoption of the principles of plot-based urbanism. Plot-based urbanism offers an innovative approach to development, based on an urban structure made up of fine-grained elements, in the form of plots, capable of incremental development by a range of agencies. The morphological study of traditional, pre-war masterplanning methods in Glasgow suggests that a typically disaggregated pattern of land subdivision remains of great relevance for development, and that the physical form and organisation of urban land may enhance the capacity for neighbourhood self-organisation. This study undertakes analysis of historic changes in plot formation, and uses the results to suggest ways of making housing investment more informed and responsive to urban change. It derives core principles of land subdivision, and presents these principles in a set of normative design codes that can be used to pass effective control over the process of land subdivision in regeneration areas to a range of potential developers. By doing so, activity in housing-led regeneration can be increased beyond the rate possible by our current reliance on existing public and private development models. It is argued that the publicly-funded sector could take on the role of lead provider of opportunity, through the adoption of new plot-based development processes, thereby supporting communities in the sustainable reuse of vacant inner-city land.
Date of Award20 May 2018
Original languageEnglish
Awarding Institution
  • University Of Strathclyde
SupervisorOmbretta Romice (Supervisor) & Sergio Porta (Supervisor)

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