Manuel de Sola MoralesPublic and collective spaceThe urbanization of theprivate domain as a new challengeSince the late nineteenth century, the distinction betweenpublic space and private space has been a major theme in Westernthink urban. The onion tbreidingsplannen, the expropriation lawsthe metropolitan parks and major civil works of the ti jd his fineexamples of d i t distinction. It was desired, this distinction toamplify long as it makes it became possible to the public domain -more important than the private property - to increase and improve.This appreciation of public spaces was rooted in theUtopian thinking of the last century, where the ideal modelbalanced city (as a target) and the formation of a device gemeentel i jk(As a tool) the ideological pillars were of every progressivecity politics.To defend this day and officials involvedtechnicians public green, reservations and infrastructurefacilities and open urban space as the principal urban plannergoal. And maintain it pol ici and bewonersorganisat ies, according tothe same idea, the requirement of "public square meter" as the best wayto make the city more available to its state residents.Since belangri jke theories about the city in the seventiesdeveloped the distinction between public and private space alongtwo main lines. The first, based on the studies of mono grave iccities, grabbed the value of the strict building line again when the instrumentto the main typological elements of the urban brand i jke shapedefine (streets, parks, expansion areas, centers). This approachunited with the second one, onion tgaand the far not mourn in the'Architecture of the city, "starring the great architecturalobjects highlighted in the symbol ic f ive igurat define the cityand her memory.The third, perhaps most trivial approach to the concept of thepublic area (and thereby accepting the most simple) in order for thepublic space design as a system: as a sequence of openareas thus forming a uni form a whole. As the system of parksOlmsted in Boston, Henard weighing system in Paris or theThis article was published in March 1992 in the cultural supplement of the newspaper La Vanguardia.school system of the English post-war 'neighborhood planning.It is the latter approach which is included in the so-called'General system' of our urban planning regulations, developedhas become one of the most rigid and rigid concepts of publicspace.The other approaches - which of the value of the city as an architecturaland those of the urban fabric as a design task - led to the"Drawn urbanism" and "urban town planning 'as methodologicalhypotheses the funct ional ist symbolic abstraction of the stain andzoning had to overcome and again demanded the attentionfor the shape of the city as a specific spatial structure. TheCatalan urbanization in the beginning of the eighties, forms the samplepar excellence of this approach.Many of the better current urban programs are rootedin this theoretical 'acceleration' in the seventies to the cityand cherished focal point was the urban,political and sociological attention.In recent years, the remarkable achievement of publicspaces and public buildings in several European cities - thesePrinciples remote part next, partly forgetting - some brilliantwindows yielded full aesthetic consumer good. Picturesare competitive in the mass but no urbanprovide arguments sense of the long term.In Barcelona, after the installation of a democratic government, was'Escape' to the public space spectacular. It seemed like everythingturned around to conquer the public space and celebrate. The hard squaresappeared, and the less hard. Each filling that gap between the buildingsremained open. Between 1978 and 1982 they paid their full energy into itexploiting these holes and holes for a new face to the citygive (a different style and a different logic) and there is one noteworthysuccessfully managed.Not so much because the designs were always equally successful, but ratherbecause seeing changing the urban landscape from its voidsanyway it was a new and innovative experience. Barcelona did noteveryone recognize that, but outside there was universally acclaimed.After 1982 appeared the parks. A stream of large public spacescould be added to the city by the dismantle ing estatesor industrial areas. The size and location of the parks were free willrandom; like the squares they appeared wherever it was possible.Namely where the congregation could intervene relatively simple; through aalready started rehabilitation intervention to bend (la Merce, Raval), onabandoned industrial sites (Espanya Industrial, Pegaso) on already publicbut unused places (Sants Excorxador, Moll de la Fusta) orsimply by redesigning public squares (Plaza Reial, plazasde Gracia). Although it would take to search for spatialconsistency of these procedures it will be appreciated that the occasionmain criterion was the choice of location. The opportunity for amunicipal system to act - on land that is not privatelyhands - so as to the amount of spaces whose management,property and design enabled increase of the church andimprove. Image and property of the city identified themselves more andmore with each other, in such a way that it Barcelona of these yearshas shown how 'modern' by a civil service made canbe and how, as a consequence, in urban publicspaces a strong image and even can give a lead.But it would be dangerous if we would only make us worry aboutthe shape of the city where that city management is of the municipaldevice. In the last few years have little meaningful and robustdevelopments in the private domain which occurred innovativethere may be mentioned (for example in the field of housing oroffices). And right would always, in addition to the superb value and flawlessmerit of enriching the city with boulevards, parks,squares, ring roads, stadiums, museums and theaters, a widening spectrumof the common town can be produced which contributesthe hypertrophy of the public space itself.The importance of public space lies not in the degree of vastness,the quantitative superiority of the symbolic lead it, butthe connections between them in private, confined spaces,which are also areas which made collective heritage. An urban,give public character of those buildings that otherwise onlywould be decided - the urbanization of the private domain - that's itconcept. That is, the private record in the sphere of influencethe public.Take for example the old town. The breakthroughs in the Raval arelargely the legacy of a planning with a long history. TheMost was built on land that was available for publicsurgeries. In other parts of the district's open spaces are defined bythe lot boundaries of demolished houses or blocks, nothing more. Therewhere new building has appeared, the contradictionclear of modern construction techniques in the old tissuetrying to fit in, and the middle class modern homes prove -paradoxically - bombastic and little functional.The operations consist largely of new homes, squares andparking basements, and this simplicity is perhaps the cause of the schematichardness of the result. The shape of the space in the old townshould refer to the discussion of the social objective of thechanges in this area and thus the potential forprogram.Perhaps they should have been for the rooms in the old townsearch for a new typological form for pensions, more hygienicbars and nightclubs and joint shelter for artisans and merchants,then to middle class homes or new university libraries.And a number of existing, already frequently transformedfragments in the current structure could provide solutionstailored much more are on the way of life in that area than thegreat emptiness that results from the Central European's 'sanitary' planning.The operation at this impressive supposed revitalization seemswill therefore not take place. The public as a label ofsquares, houses and garages did not directly required contributiondelivered to the collective appropriation of this by the townspeople,which one wanted to identify.It's not that the projects realized in the old city not goodwould be, but for a so complicated the task exclusively is'Public' characteristic enough: the hypertrophy of the "official city 'neglects certain forms of collective life and can evenMake disappear. The collective space is much more and much less than thepublic space as we see it limited to public ownership. Thecivil, architectural, urbanistic and morphological wealtha city is that of collective spaces, of all the places where theeveryday life takes place, and presents itself as a souvenir presentis. And perhaps that is increasingly spaces that are not public or private,but both at the same time: public spaces for private activitiesused or spaces that allow a collective use. Is' elCorte Ingles ", the big department store on Plaza Catalunya, a public ora private domain? Economically, it is clearly a privatematter, but it does not apply to the use and meaninghas for the city. It is no coincidence that discussion there for five yearsover the wall renew. And the church of Santa Maria del MarPublic or private? And the Barcelona football stadium?Public and private water down the categories and no longer suffice.Even some outstanding public places such as the Plaza Sant Jaume orRambla fully disclosed because of their significance and ownership,change in collective spaces through the free pillaging byseveral private activities. In Barcelona, many examplesFinding such mixing areas with a significant collective meaning.The Boqueria market is perhaps the most striking example:a place where the public ownership and management effortlessly combinewith private initiatives and activities of users, ornow sellers are whether all those people who work on the complementaryactivities that generate the market in its immediate vicinity. Or take the nowdisappeared restaurants on the beach of Barceloneta. But the baron the corner, the school, the newspaper kiosk or metro stop a spatialsystem with different rights and obligations, which as public butAlso collective system determines the main lines along which the urban lifeunfolds. It also play an important strictly public areasrole, although only partially, and perhaps even less with the daynecessary.A mall or a pasture shop, an amusement park or astadium, a large parking lot or a shopping arcade are the telltalespots in everyday life, the collective spaces of our time.And especially public transport in major cities is a commonreference point. Because of the frequency and extent of the massive use,because of the variety of public and psychological weight asmeaning bearer of metropolitan life. The latest film by EricRohmer - Conte d'hiver - shows this well. This in contrast to the l ingobject-based approach to urban space by Wim Wenders.Hotels, restaurants, weekend and tourist centers, peripheral discotheques;it is these undefined spaces where the public form of theCity deploying the game. The periphery is paradoxically the actualcenter of the life of the city and will be formedbe passed through the spaces which have a meaning as places ofsociety without the rhetoric of formal representation.When working on the new urban retirements is the task of the urbaniststo make an intermediate of these spaces. Neitherpublic nor private but the opposite; areas which are not sterileand delivered to the publicity but form a stimulating partthe multiform urban fabric. And it is important to the Keynesian'Welfare city' - or in other words the subsidized urbanity - movemore risky, less obvious and more interestingareas. If not, we risk jamming in the categories ofbaroque urban space, albeit adapted to the latest in style and fashionmaterial.Recognizing this problem is extremely important for the urbandesign and opens a new field of research by differentscales back running. At present we ignore the classicexplanation of public space as an expression of the agreedvalues within a company, and thus the condition of the publicas a form par excellence of the social. The fact is, by contrast, that the cityexactly the place where the private domain can be a social domain andis often too; as much, or more so, than the public. The 'good' cityTherefore, the city where the private buildings and public elementsradiate a social meaning and value that go beyond thebuilding itself and in which their urban character lies. The residential palaceson the Paseo de Gracia or the shops on Calle Ferran its urbanphenomena which have much more significance than that of the privateownership. In this manner, the city is built up both in good houses,good shops and good bars and from boulevards and monumentsrepresentative buildings. The great city is the city that manages aprovide public value to the private domain. In addition, is the quality ofthe individual a condition for its contribution to the collective.Is it not true that the bars of the night Barcelona one of the mostinteresting urban phenomena of form in recent years? Why?Because of their private nature is not separate from the attentioncollective values and interests.The collective spaces constitute the wealth of historic towns andare certainly the main structure for the future ish town.Perhaps it is true that the undefined spaces in our citiesincreasingly signifiers of everyday life in differentmethods may be used, and appropriated by the differenturban "tribes". Perhaps it is true that the shape of the 'place-less'city, over which Frederic Jameson writes, a loss of the co-public space and private authority characterizes our environment.They say that gives the 'cyberpunk' literature beautiful descriptionsthis modern condition where the distinction between public and privatefades by abolishing the differences that were conducted.It is said that these differences are abolished in Blade Runner. And alsoUmberto Eco left them behind when he wrote of the new medievalcharacter of the current territory.It therefore seems a significant theoretical mistake topublic urban spaces to conceive only as a venue for aarchitecture without content or design objects, and with a consistency thatdoes not extend beyond the object itself. Al s urban beautification 'hasundoubtedly contributed to the recognition of the importance of aestheticcity operations. But for a master plan with more ambitionsatisfies neither the neo-typologisme a la Durand, who as public worksconsiders classify structures nor the neo-picturesque a la Sitte, whichthe leading role of the public areas to the archi tectonic contextshifts (most 'modern' urban design programs of the mainEuropean cities are children of these views). They denythe complex nature of the collective urban space and limit whatan area of experiences should be up to a space defined byprejudices.Translation: Els Bet