Reading Socio-Spatial Interplay - Arkitektur- og designhøgskolen i ...

R E A D I N G S O C I O - S P A T I A L I N T E R P L A Y P A R T 2spaces (example: Ringnes Park). The internal open green spaces ofsuch projects are not meant to function as public urban parks: insteadof being connected to public streets they are surrounded by domesticbuildings that with their windows, entrances and balconies give visualcontrol over the activities of the open green spaces. But as some ofthese internal spaces, both in terms of size and accommodation, haveuse qualities for stay and play, and due to the fact that the spaces areopen for strangers to stroll through the area, the potential for somekind of social interface between neighbors and strangers is introducedinto the internal outdoor spaces of the housing projects. To someextent this can be compared to the open neighborhood spaces of thearchitectural system of reformed urban blocks, in terms of a moreprivate supplement to the system of public urban parks and a morepublic supplement to the closed courtyards of the traditional urbanblocks. However, in comparison with the semi-public neighbourhoodspaces of the reformed urban block system, the internal spaces of thenew housing projects are significantly narrower and darker.Furthermore, as all the surrounding apartments have private balconiesand access to shared rooftop terraces, they may also end up beingused as primarily transit zones, i.e. as pedestrian shortcuts through theblock both for the inhabitants themselves, when they’re not in need ofusing the underground parking garages, and for people walking by, ifthey are not locked out of the area.d) Slab blocks and point blocks spatially organized to define acontinuous street façade towards the public street, with or withoutstreet-oriented non-domestic programs towards the street, containinga shared green outdoor space in relation to a public park space(examples: Waldemars Hage, Sofies Hage). The introduction of anumber of apartment windows and balconies oriented towards ashared private outdoor space that is directly related to an existingpublic park space, introduces a new dialectic relation to the situationof the existing public park space: The new housing projects and theirshared private outdoor spaces bring new types of visualregimentation, activities and social control into the public park space(which can be viewed as both positive and negative, depending onpoint of view and upon the various kinds of activities that take place,or are meant to take place, in of the public park space). If the sharedprivate outdoor spaces are kept open and accessible, they can be set towork as an extension of the public park system, at least for usergroups that are comfortable with supervision and find pleasure in232