Urban Design Vocabulary Quiz

Urban Design and Landscape Vocabulary

• Porch: An exterior appendage to a building, often covered and supported by columns, leading to the building entrance.
• Portico: A porch, especially one roofed, supported by columns.
• Port Cochere: A porch roof projecting over a driveway at the building entry, offering shelter for vehicles.
• Terrace: An open paved outdoor living area connected to a building.
• Veranda: A large open porch, often roofed.
• Lanai: A veranda, especially a fully furnished living room outdoors.
• Balcony: A platform projecting from a building wall, typically enclosed by a balustrade.
• Openings: Exterior apertures, such as balconies, terraces or porches.
• Arbor: A leafy recess, often formed by intertwined branches of trees, shrubs, or vines.
• Arch: A curved structure connecting two uprights.
• Gate: An opening in a wall, fence or hedge; a point of transition.
• Trellis: A structure made up of latticework; used for plants.
• Garden Hallway: A garden passage, often enclosed or marked by hedges.
• Hedges: A line of low-growing shrubs forming a wall, boundary, or backdrop for garden features.
• Espalier: Trees whose branches are pruned, creating formal patterns against a wall.
• Palisade: A row of closely planted shrubs or trees; creates a green wall.
• Treillage: Latticework construction, often used in a garden.
• Garden Wall: A line of stone or wood separating landscapes or garden spaces.
• Lawn: Grassy areas, usually mowed, used for recreational space.
• Terrace: A raised level of earth, sometimes retained by stone or concrete, with surfaces of stone, brick, turf or ground cover.
• Meadow: Richly grassed areas for mowing or pasture, offering transitional spaces between gardens and the countryside.
• Parterre: A flat terraced surface used for creating foliage patterns.
• Pathways: Ornamental and functional components in the garden, composed of plants or gravel to guide movement.
• Tapis Vert: A swath of lawn, usually rectilinear, designed to enhance visual axes or highlight focal points.
• Angle of Repose: The steepest angle at which a material can be piled without slumping.
• Espalier: Trees with branches trained against a wall, fence, or framework.

Urban Design Controls

• Floor Area Ratio (FAR) / Plot Ratio: The ratio between the area of the built space and the lot area.
• Floor Space Index (FSI): The ratio of floor space to site area.
• Land Use Planning & Zoning: Legal regulation of land use, determining types of building and development.
• Incentive Zoning: Zoning that allows more building space if developers provide amenities.
• Cluster Zoning: Regulations for medium-to-large developments.
• Environmental Impact Statement (EIS): A document evaluating potential environmental effects of a project.
• Environmental Preservation: Safeguarding natural areas from urban expansion.
• Conservation Area: Designated for buildings with significant architectural or historical value.
• Urban Renewal: Overhauling older urban areas to improve conditions.
• Adaptive Reuse: Converting existing buildings for new functions.
• Rehabilitation: Repairing and revitalizing older buildings.
• Invasion: The introduction of new elements or population into existing areas.
• Centralization: Increasing population density in a geographic centre.
• Gentrification: Improving the physical appearance of formerly dilapidated areas.
• Block-Boosting: Forcing the existing population out of an area, often linked to social or racial changes.
• Planned Unit Developments (PUDs) / Cluster Zoning: Used for intensive development in areas previously undeveloped.
• Transit-Oriented Developments (TODs): Mixed-use communities within a walkable distance of transit stations.

History of Settlement

• Agricultural Societies: Developed settlements for herding, and later defense.
• Rectilinear/Grid layout: Common in agricultural and militaristic societies.
• Circular/Fencing: Defensive and common in herding cultures.
• Radiocentric/Circular: Common in places where resources are abundant.

Renaissance-Early Developments

• Ideal Cities (1440): Renaissance emphasis on harmonious design and urban space.
• Leon Battista Alberti: Key figure in Renaissance urban theory and design.
• Biaggio Rossetti: Early modern urban designer emphasizing city improvement, expansion, and plans for cities.
• Leonardo da Vinci: Concepts of city planning incorporating river systems and multi-level city layouts.
• Andrea Palladio: A key figure in Renaissance landscape and architectural design.
• Urban plazas (France, England): Renaissance-era development of public spaces.
• Parks and Gardens (Italy, France): Landscape improvements connected to palaces, and plazas.
• Jacques Androuet du Cerceau/Inigo Jones: Designed public spaces in France and England.
• Renaissance urban planning (Rome): Examples from the renaissance era such as the creation of St. Peter's Cathedral, Campidoglio, or Piazza del Popolo.
• Palladian Influences: Designs reflecting Renaissance ideals, including urban plans.