Geddes Plan

Geddes Plan (1925), Tel Aviv's first master plan

The Geddes Plan is the first general plan of the city of Tel Aviv ( Israel ), developed in 1925 - 1929 by the Scottish urban planner Sir Patrick Geddes , on which the current center and the "old north" of the city were built. Approved and launched in 1932 , the plan created the physical basis for the development of the city, as well as for its expansion to the east in the 1940s and 1950s .

For natural reasons, the Geddes plan foresaw the development of the city to the north (the Arab city of Jaffa was located south of Tel Aviv): from the Jaffa-Jerusalem railway to the Yarkon River . The eastern border of the plan was Ibn-Gabirol Street , the western - the Mediterranean Sea . Longitudinal streets (from north to south) were intended for trade, and transverse boulevards and streets on hot days were blown by the sea breeze. The plan also provided many public parks woven into the texture of the city.

Sir Patrick Geddes served as a city planner in many British colonies, his plan was part of the efforts of the British authorities to develop a mandated Palestine . Tel Aviv has become one of the few cities where Geddes managed to implement the principles of a garden city . A single urban structure (the largest by area among Israeli cities), called the "White City" , was included in the UNESCO World Heritage List .

Content

1 History
- 1.1 Development of Tel Aviv until 1920
2 Plan
- 2.1 The system of new streets
- 2.2 The block of the city according to Geddes
- 2.3 Land
3 White city
4 See also

History

Tel Aviv Development Until 1920

Since the end of the 19th century, several Jewish satellite neighborhoods of the city of Jaffa were founded, for example, Neve Tzedek and Kerem HaTeimanim ( English Kerem HaTeimanim ). Ahuzat Bait, which was founded in 1909, was actually the first quarter, which was supposed to become a Jewish city, and was the first "urban center" around which new quarters began to emerge, which eventually became Tel Aviv. In the territory of modern Tel Aviv-Jaffa, there were several more Arab villages (Sumeil, Manshia and Sheikh Munis ) next to the Jewish quarters and the Sharon templar colony, traces of which still exist in the modern city.

Already in 1920, the accelerated growth of the city due to waves of emigration began to worry the city government. Histadrut HaZionit (union) appealed to Richard Kaufmann in 1920 to express his opinion on the further development of the city, and to draw up a master plan for the area north of Allenby Street to Yehuda HaLevi, turning north in the east. The Kaufmann plan took into account the north-south axes intersected by transverse axes facing the sea, which were later implemented in a more detailed Geddes plan. In 1925, the mayor of the city, Meir Dizengoff, invited, with the recommendation of the British authorities, the urban planner Patrick Geddes, to draw up the first master plan of the developing city and all areas north of the existing city. In the same year, Geddes prepared a full review, which documented the state of the city at that time and the economic, socio-demographic development trends. The city at that time had less than 30,000 inhabitants. The plan called for solutions to resettle 100,000 people.

Plan

New Street System

The plan defined several main streets that formed the urban skeleton, which connected with Ahuzat Bait and already existing neighborhoods. The network of new streets, unlike the existing ones, included several longitudinal north-south streets and transverse east-west streets, which all reach the sea.

The main longitudinal streets, north-south are Ha-Yarkon , Ben Yehuda, Dizengoff , Reines and Sokolov streets , Shlomo haMeleh, HeN boulevard and partially Meleh George street.

The main longitudinal streets, from the sea to the east are Alenby, the northernmost part of which breaks to the sea on Mugrabi Square, Bugrashov Street - Ben Zion Boulevard, Frischman, Gordon Street, KaKaL Boulevard (which later became Ben Gurion Boulevard), Arlozorov Street, . Kibbutz Galuiot, st. Basel and Nordau Boulevard.

Longitudinal streets were supposed to serve as shopping streets, and transverse streets as green boulevards, or just residential ones, and connect the entire city texture with the seashore. In fact, only Dizengoff, Ben Yehuda and Ha-Yarkon streets are shopping streets, and trees along the boulevards are really planted on the transverse streets, but only a part of them are called boulevard .

Geddes City Block

An example of a typical Geddes block

Between the grid of new streets, dozens of city blocks with common features were designed in order to create a unity of place and continuity of the city structure. A typical “Geddes Block” is an ideal that was implemented in each of the designed blocks each time a little differently, depending on the conditions of the place, the axes of the nearest roads and other considerations. The goal of Geddes was to create mini-communities from the urban population inside residential blocks, using the functioning of the city block as a little intimate unit, and at the same time serving the main roads of the city.

The ideal block was built as a square with a side of 200 meters, sandwiched between 4 main streets, stretching from the block and forming part of a large network of streets. Longitudinal streets, north-south, were designed as shopping streets, and transverse like green boulevards reaching the sea and allowing air to flow into the city. Shopping streets combined trade on the lower floor and the construction of 3-4 residential floors above it. The block itself was divided into four parts by four lanes with the letter T. Today, these lanes are most often one-way for traffic. A public square or other public building is being built on the territory between these streets: a school, a kindergarten or a clinic. In the center of some blocks, additional residential buildings were built.

Different variations were made on the basis of an ideal block, and in fact very few blocks were built exactly as ideal. In some there are only three lanes, or in some blocks the lane goes right through, but the basic idea of the block is preserved, and gives uniformity to the city structure.

Building plot

In an attempt to create the optimal density of housing development, Geddes set the development lines in the plots according to the following principles: the typical plot area is about 500 sq. M. m., and in its center is a building surrounded by vegetation. Building lines ran 4 meters from the edge of the plot behind the building, 4 meters from the facade to the sidewalk edge and 3 meters along the edges of the plot, which provided a distance of 6 meters between the houses. The undeveloped part of the site was intended for planting vegetation, breaking a front garden , growing ornamental and fruit trees.

The result of this design was the construction of buildings up to four floors, most often including two apartments per floor. At first, the spaces between the houses really served as squares, but over the years their use decreased, and they were fenced, or turned into parking lots. On the other hand, buildings in the "old north" of the city and in its center, built according to similar principles, retain their original appearance.

White City

The center of the White City in Tel Aviv, officially recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site , is located in the area built up according to the Geddes plan, and most of the 4,000 buildings in this complex are concentrated in it. Despite the fact that many houses in the international style typical of the White City are located in the area of the old center of Tel Aviv, in the south of the city ( Neve Tzedek and Florentin areas) and in other areas, the urban approach of the Geddes plan was in good agreement with the modern style and created a unique urban style. This has become one of the factors in ranking the White City as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.