Decoding of urban patterns

As part of the design project "Resettlement and Conversion in industrial and shrinking Areas" urban patterns of existing settlements were decoded and an urban design strategy for a resettlement project in Mühlrose south of Cottbus was developed. Here, the application of computer-aided parametric, rule-based or generative design methods should be tested. Students of the master’s degree in architecture at the Lausitz University of Applied Sciences were involved. The question that should be answered with regard to the digital methods was: Is there a settlement code, comparable to the DNA code of living beings, which regulates the structure, the growth and the relationship of the individual elements to each other? The work consisted in the analysis of so-called "hard" parameters with spatial structural relevance as well as "soft" influencing factors that take into account a social community and the individual user. From this analysis, students developed site- and stock-related resettlement strategies, which then served as the basis for the urban planning designs.