This document discusses the role that urban morphology plays in supporting innovation and economic growth. It argues that cities act as incubators by providing conducive built environments. Specifically, it points to the importance of (1) buildings with adaptable spaces, (2) "generative" street networks that support diverse neighborhoods, and (3) well-connected city-scale street systems. The document uses examples from Manchester and London to illustrate how urban form has historically supported the growth of new industries.

1. THE CITY AS INCUBATOR: THE
ROLE PLAYED BY URBAN
MORPHOLOGY
BUILDING ON THE IDEAS OF
JANE JACOBS
FRANCESCA FROY, The Bartlett, UCL
* Research in Greater Manchester supported by a PhD Scholarship from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

2. •Introduction: cities as incubators
•Building conducive urban environments:
1. Buildings and frontages - adaptability
2. Neighbourhoods - ‘generative’ street systems which
support diversity
3. City-scale – ensuring connectivity
•Conclusions
STRUCTURE

3. ‘Self--generating
economic culture of
cities’ (Soja,2000)
Trade networks,
feedback loops &
import substitution
Why in
cities?
Diverse
supply
chains
Through problem solving
and suggestions from
materials and technologies
New work develops
from fragments of
‘parent’ work
Division of labour as a dynamic process that
involves branching from generalities
Financing
and space
Diversity and difference as one of the
highest forms of order
From strategies and ‘visions’ to
emergent growth
Skills

4. Glass
Soap &
detergents
Machining
Paint
Dyes
Art
Textile printing
Engineering
Computing &
electronics
Alkalis/’heavy
chemicals’
Chemicals
Chlorine/vitriol
Organic chemistry
Rubbers & plastics
Drugs & pharmaceuticals
Synthetic fibres,
waterproofing
TEXTILES
Coal
Petrochemicals
Perfumes
Industrial gases
Clothes Wholesalers
Merchants
& financiers
Banking
Anti-corrosion
Paper
Common machines/technologies
with textiles
Economies
branching over
history..

5. Potentials for industry relatedness in Greater Manchester
Analysis of potential skills-relatedness between Greater Manchester industries (based on model developed
by Neffke, Otto and Weyh, 2017)

6. 1. BUILDINGS AND FRONTAGES
Adaptability

7. Adaptable spaces in
“Industrial streets”?
Railway arches..

8. From manufacture to storage
to distribution in “Industrial
streets”?
Strangeways, Manchester

9. 2. NEIGHBOURHOODS
‘Generative’ street systems which support
diversity

10. Old Kent Road, London Source: CASS Cities OKR A-Z
http://casscities.co.uk/

11. Mandela Way
Source: CASS Cities OKR A-Z
http://casscities.co.uk/
Source for photos: Google Maps

12. Comparing industrial
morphologies
Hatcham Road
Source: CASS Cities OKR A-Z
http://casscities.co.uk/
Source for photos: Google Maps

13. Manchester more
integrated than its
neighbouring local
authorities
Evidence of smaller
town centres (e.g.
Bolton, Oldham)
SALFORD
MANCHESTER
Integration
of street
network

14. LOCALLY INTEGRATED AREAS
At walking distance (800m)
Northern Quarter – from manufacturing and
wholesaling hub to creative quarter
Areas of terraced
housing
Trafford Industrial
Park

15. Generative
grids
Strangeways & Cheetham Hill (1950s)Northern Quarter (William Stevenson, 1780)

16. Urban morphology and encounter
Southworth & Ben-Joseph, 2013

17. http://ajrae.staff.shef.ac.uk/buildings/
Alliance project textiles data
Textiles diversity in
Strangeways

18. 1943 South of River Irwell in Broughton
Generative neighbourhoods and innovation
www.H&M.com
e.g. history of the
McIntosh

19. Co-agglomeration between sectors at the neighbourhood level (MSOA)
Based on analysis of statistically significant co-agglomeration of sectors in
Greater Manchester MSOAs using IDBR data, 2016

20. Altringham,
North
Manchester
Industries that are more like to be
locally co-located with
telecommunications

21. AltringhamPotential local
interdependencies

22. Winkley Estate, Bethnal Green (1900) Gillett Square, Hackney
Source: Froy, Davis and Dhanani (2017)
Bringing commercial
spaces into liveable
communities

23. 3. CITY-SCALE
Ensuring local-global connectivity

24. Where is
manufacturing
happening?
Manufacturing across the
Greater Manchester street
system

25. Prioritising
accessible
centres
Manufacturing across the
Greater Manchester street
system

26. TEXTILES
MANUFACTURERS
Grey boundary = greenbelt

27. http://ajrae.staff.shef.ac.uk/buildings/
Greater Manchester Alliance Textiles Project
Textiles diversity in
Strangeways

28. http://ajrae.staff.shef.ac.uk/buildings/
Openstreet map

29. Conclusions: preparing fertile ground for growth
Adaptable buildings: Flexible and adaptable spaces which support creativity
and growth (spaces that are “unfinished” –Rantisi & Leslie, 2010)
Generative neighbourhoods: the importance of a local ‘hierarchy of spaces’ to
generate economic diversity..the intermingling of buildings of different ages,
types, sizes and conditions of upkeep (Jacobs, 1961), coupled with ‘generative’
street systems (Hillier, 1996)
Connected cities: local diverse and adaptable spaces connected into global
street networks (Read, 2015)

30. Publications

31. Froy F. and Davis, H (2017) Pragmatic urbanism: London’s railway arches and
small-scale enterprise, European Planning Studies, 25:11
Hillier, B. (1996) Space is the Machine: a configurational theory of
architecture, Cambridge University Press
Jacobs, J. (1961) Death and Life of Great American Cities, The Modern Library,
New York
Read, S. (2015) Cities as infrastructures of diversification and homogenisation:
constructing multiformal spaces in Paris and Shenzen, New Diversities, Vol.2, 7
Soja, E., W (2000) Postmetropolis: critical studies of cities and regions, Oxford,
Blackwell.
Further reading