The city from distance
The analysis and interpretation of the “City from distance” represented one of the main challenges we faced and that led our research.
The intention was to interpret and overlay two different points of view, the results of two methodologies, the spatial analysis of who can interpret the site only from a distance and the experiential one of who lives on the spot.
Where: Nuevo Polanco, before called “Colonia Granada” is an area of Mexico City that has captured our interest for the results of the regeneration intervention. An urban regeneration strategy that came principally by business interests, but where its second-order effects were gentrification and social segregation.
The experimental methodology has seen the research, the analysis, and subsequent overlapping of the data and results of the two analytical modes:
- Spatial Analysis ( Space Syntax)
- Experiential Analysis ( site visits and surveys )
In conclusion, the two methods showed how spatial analysis and the use of tools like space syntax can help us to understand the site and in a general way the infrastructural problems, but ignoring the real problems of the people who use the space. Points of view sometimes far from those of experts such as architects or engineers, who often ignore the human side of the street, which is the fundamental element for a street to have life and for a city to function as such.
On the other hand, the use of technology is increasingly becoming a fundamental tool for city planning with the use of data that allows us to have exact data to be able to intervene or plan. For this reason, tools such as space syntax can become a very powerful tool if we integrate the opinions of citizens.
