Fractals and Urban Planning

As the readers of my blog can observe, I am doing a great deal of thought about fractal analysis, agent based modeling as they apply to urban development and planning. This is related to a paper which I hope to submit to a suitable journal concerning the use of fractal analysis of Istanbul. More will be posted about this soon to be completed manuscript.

Recently, I downloaded a fractal program that is very easy to use and started to examine the different variations of some of the fractals. Although I am not a programmer, the language was very easy to alter. I would recommend this program for some exploration in fractal analysis.
The download for this program can be found at: http://www.contextfreeart.org/download.html
I found this program while searching for more literature on fractal analysis and cities. Actually, I first came across this blog concerning fractals Dataisnature at http://dataisnature.com/ which directed me to this program. Dataisnature is an excellent blog in this area and presents the enthusiasm that many have toward fractal analysis.

As ideas sometimes emerge, these random bits of thought dawned on me, although I have loosely thought about these themes previously.

Fractals are generated by rules which
result in a end state at one period of time (Actually there is no end state but there is also no entropy with fractal generation)

Dimension and lacunarity measurements are indications of the characteristics of the fractal at one point in time (A 'rolling' measurement of a fractal as it is being developed would be very useful.)

The basic elements of fractals are
1. the starting point (s)
2. rules
3. generation
4. end state at time X

In urban development, the rules determine the generation of the built environment
In urban planning the rules would go beyond the formal rules such as policies and regulations but would also include 'rules' such as economic factors, goals of stakeholders, and technology.
Complexity arises because of the changing and multiple rules and their effects. It is challenging and interesting to model these elements as is presently being done using cellular automata. Using these tools we can generate an infinite set of possible outcomes. Agent-based modeling is also being incorporated and in the future cellular automata and agent based modeling will be 'tightly coupled' or evolve into something else. (I don't know if there are the right words, but I could not think of any other ones at this writing.) The problems lie as in all modeling in the ability to approximate reality. This has also the alternative term in modeling as calibration.
If they will actually predict a future state is really not the point. The point is to rapidly explore various scenarios. If in cellular automata see the effects of different rules, then these would be clues to how we can manage the complexity of the urban environment. However, I do not think that research in cellular automata has approached this level yet.


Taking this approach, the rational long-range planning process where a governing body produces 20 years plans are at best worthy efforts to deal with trying to shape the direction of urban development and at worst a pointless and perhaps costly exercise whose only product will be a document which sit on the shelves of a government office. According to this logic, planners should not so much be concerned about long range planning, but concentrate on the policies, regulations, enforcement, formal and informal interaction with various stakeholders and capital improvement planing. Cities will continue to develop chaotically no matter what long range plans we develop.

Any comments on some of my statements would be welcome. As always, I will hopefully develop these ideas further.

Urban Fractal Analysis

Fractal analysis combined with GIS offers tools to examine in a quantatative manner the development of the physical structure of cities. By clicking on the above link, you can download a paper that I presented at GEOMED 2007, which was held in Kemer, Turkey in June 2007, concerning the use of fractal analysis to examine Istanbul's urban structure. I am presently working on a new paper based on some of the ideas that were presented in this paper. Any comments on this paper or general comments about fractal analysis as it is being used in urban analysis would be welcome.

While developing an upper level course for undergraduates concerning Agent-Based Modelling (ABM) and GIS for the Fall 2007 semester, I have started to think about about the linkages between ABM and fractal analysis. However, my thoughts on this area are still in the formation stage. It is anticipated that in a later blog and paper, I can futher expand my ideas. Again, any comments on this area are welcomed.

Accepting Manuscripts for Fall 2007 Urbana

Urbana is now accepting manuscripts for the Fall 2007 issue of Urbana. All necessary information concerning submittal is located on the journal's website (click the above link.)
Urbana is listed on several indices and is peer-reviewed.

PowerPoint Presentation for AAG Conference 2007

At the AAG Conference in April 2007, I will be presenting concerning transportation in South East Europe. Click on the link and save as.

Agent Based and Cellular Automata

Agent-based modeling (ABM) and cellular automata (CA) holds potential for modeling urban phenomena. However, there are some significant inter-operability problems preventing it going beyond theoretical or isolated applications. A real link needs to be made between these models and a GIS. One of the basic problems is that GIS is static and these techniques are dynamic. While ABM and CA can model complex and chaotic phenomena, a spatial data interface is necessary so that these modeling methods can go beyond theoretical to application.

I would appreciate any comments on this topic.

Accepting Manuscripts for Spring 2007 Volume of Urbana

We are now accepting papers for the Spring 2007 volume of Urbana. Papers concerning any aspect of urbanism are welcome. The submission guidelines are listed at: http://www.tamuk.edu/geo/Urbana/ . Please submit your manuscripts to either Dr. Jesus Trevino at: jtrevino41@hotmail.com or Dr. Michael A. McAdams at mcadams@fatih.edu.tr

New Volume of Urban: Hot off the Internet Press

The link above will take you directly to the new issue of Urbana for Autumn 2006.
The articles are very diverse and of high quality, as is the tradition of the journal.

If you have any comments, I would be very willing to post them ,if they are appropriate, on this blog. You can also send them to the urbana blog at: http://journalurbana.blogspot.com/.

We will be coming out with a new issue in Spring. There is a possibility of a special issue perhaps later on this year related to the Global Cities confenence depending on the number of articles received. We welcome anyone who is a academician or researcher in the area of urbanism (which is a very broad area) to submit your articles.

Morality and New Urbanism

I was doing some searching and landed on this site (click above link.) There are a whole group of articles on morality and New Urbanism. I am in the process of reading the articles and will post further comments, if appropriate. I would welcome any readers of my blog, which apparently is just a few persons, to read these set of articles and post your responses.

If you would like to expand your argument into a full paper, please keep Urbana in mind as a possible place for publication.

Global Cities Conference

I presented a paper at the Global Cities 2006 conferenece held in Liverpool on29-30 June 2006. The link for the conference is at:
http://hopelive.hope.ac.uk/mahumanities/GolbalCities/index.htm.

Go to the above title link to review a draft of the paper or download it at:
http://geocities.com/mmcadams_fatih/culturecities.doc

 My PowerPoint Presentation can be downloaded at:
http://geocities.com/mmcadams_fatih/culturecities.ppt

 Any comments are welcome.

The Information Age City- A Bourgois Utopia (full paper)

I recently presented a paper concerning my thoughts on the Information Age-High Technology City (IAHTC) at the Crossing Borders-Building Bridges Transdisciplinary-American Studies Conference on 25-27 May 2006 held in Istanbul, Turkey Istanbul is at the crossroads of East and West so this is a most appropriate place to hold this conference. Utopian ideas are a means to build bridges to another future.

The paper is an expansion of the previous blog. You can view the entire paper by clicking on the link for this blog. I would appreciate any comments. Hopefully, this paper will be published in the near future.