American Urban Form

American urban form -- the spaces, places, and boundaries that define city life --has been evolving since the first settlements of colonial days. The changing patterns of houses,buildings, streets, parks, pipes and wires, wharves, railroads, highways, and airports reflectchanging patterns of the social, political, and economic processes that shape the city. In thisbook, Sam Bass Warner and Andrew Whittemore map more than three hundred years of the American citythrough the evolution of urban form. They do this by offering an illustrated history of "theCity" -- a hypothetical city (constructed from the histories of Boston, Philadelphia, and NewYork) that exemplifies the American city's transformation from village to regionalmetropolis.

In an engaging text accompanied by Whittemore's detailed, meticulousdrawings, they chart the City's changes. Planning for the future of cities, they remind us, requiresan understanding of the forces that shaped the city's past.

Andrew H. Whittemore is Assistant Professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of Texas Arlington.