Transformational urbanism: A revitalized view for the 21st century city

Abstract

The city can no longer be seen statically. The world is rapidly changing and solutions to urban sprawl need to be adjusted to the 21st century. Can 21st century cities expand and contract based on political ideals and exonomic thought? This paper places the city of Athens, Greece under the historical filter of Ildefonso Cerda, Camillo Sitte, and the theories of O.M. Ungers and Rem Koolhaas. Ildefonso Cerda's work reflects the idea of movement through networks with providing functional environments. Camillo Sitte views the city as an aesthetic composition, while O.M. Ungers and Rem Koolhaas take a formalistic approach to the functionality of archipelago cities. The theory of Manuel De Landa's crystalline city as a dynamic organism, with vertical and horizontal expansion through layers of hierarchies and meshwork; becomes a distant relationship of Koolhaas, Ungers, and Citte. While Cerdas theory agrees with the energy flows of cities. A graphical analysis of historical conditions of Athens, Greece attempts to consider a revitalized viewing of 21st century city as a Transformational Urbanism; energy flows become a political meshwork while hierachical organisms are an economic thought of the 21st century city