Urban design has splintered into increasingly narrow specialist disciplines since the mid Twentieth Century. Traffic engineers, statutory planners, civil engineers, landscape architects and architects each make specific but isolated contributions to urban design frameworks. Each consultant documents their position predominantly through text and two dimensional representations, occasionally with specious perspective images produced by a hand rendering specialist. This fragmented and sequential design approach inadequately addresses contemporary urban agendas, practice constraints or the potential of digital design techniques, particularly in light of increasing fears of an imminent environmental crisis and peak oil, and concerns for health, amenity and accommodating an increasingly urbanised population. The aim of my thesis is to identify and address disparities between contemporary urban design practice and society's prevailing urban agendas for integrated and sustainable cities. The hypothesis tested by my thesis is that the gulf between prevailing urban agendas of society and urban design can be reduced by developing a 'defragmented' design approach that uses rapid, parametric, four-dimensional, digital analysis and design techniques, which build upon software commonly available within the industry. This hypothesis has been tested in four ways: firstly through the analysis of urban agendas, design techniques and urban design paradigms, in both historic and contemporary contexts; secondly by identifying currently available technologies with the potential for adaptation and customisation; thirdly by development of new digital techniques; and finally by testing this defragmented approach on both simplified models and various case studies within an urban design practice as part of the embedded research program. Techniques I have developed and tested as part of the approach fit into four categories: firstly pedestrian connectivity - walkability and accessibility; secondly daylight amenity assessment; thirdly visual impact analysis assessing urban form visualisation, generation and composition; and finally feasibility modelling, including linked data yield analysis. I have evaluated the success of the approach in these studies with regard to practice constraints (time and budget) and contemporary society's pr evailing urban agendas. My rapid, defragmented design approach has resulted in new techniques shown to be used quickly and concurrently 'in-house' contributing to the urban design process, whilst meeting fee budgets and project deadlines. I have demonstrated that issues that are currently difficult to solve using the constraints of conventional planning techniques can be addressed more effectively than they are currently, whilst avoiding the considerable expense of specialised hardware/software or the appointment of additional consultants. My thesis concludes that the rapid, defragmented approach can demonstrably yield more synergistic urban design responses. The inherently flexible approach can be tailored for a myriad of different urban design scenarios, as well as potentially other disciplines. The defragmented approach can expand the realm of urban designers and increase their contribution in the generation and advocacy of sustainable planning policy and reduce the disparities between contemporary urban design practice and society's need for integrated and sustainable cities.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Canterbury, 2006. / Typescript (photocopy). "Funding provided through the Road Safety Trust Doctoral Scholarship." "Primary supervisor: Dr. Zhe Chen, Secondary supervisor: Dr. Dean H. Owen." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 172-199). Also available via the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M.L. Arch.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1991. / Vita. Abstract. Bibliography: leaves 88-90. Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (M.Arch.)--University of Detroit Mercy, 2009. / "4/28/2008." Includes bibliographical references (p. 171-172).

Thesis (M.Arch.)--University of Detroit Mercy, 2009. / "24 April 2009." Includes bibliographical references (p. 95).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 1998. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 113-117). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (M.Arch.)--University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Includes special report study entitled : Pedestrian network : an adaptive integration of elevated walkway system in Hong Kong. Includes bibliographical references. Also available in print.

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio State University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 35-36). Available online via OhioLINK's ETD Center

The present study used a multiple probe design to examined the effectiveness of a Behavioral Skills Training (BST) package that included a discrimination component for teaching two male adults with developmental disabilities pedestrian crossing skills. Each participant was evaluated on his ability to perform the step from a behavior checklist, and to discriminate between car present and car not present conditions. Results suggest the BST package was effective at improving both participants' ability to safely and independently cross the street, and that they maintained most of the skills learned during maintenance probes in actual city traffic. Teaching pedestrian skills that include hazard discrimination can lead to a more independent lifestyle for individuals with disabilities. Other implications, limitations and suggestions for further research are discussed.

Walking is one of the most commonplace forms of human expressions, yet the forms, motivations, and practices of walking vary greatly and are often at odds with dominant discourses in urban and transportation planning. As interest in pedestrian-oriented studies continues to grow, there is danger that dominant discourses will continue to reinforce the framing of pedestrians and the practices of walking as slower moving versions of the private automobile and ignore deeply embedded emotional, personal, and cognitive aspects. As such, understandings of pedestrian transportation and human agency during walking must be explored in increasingly human-centered terms in order to understand how changes to the material environment actually impact people and daily practices. The purpose of this dissertation is to give considerably more attention to the human elements of walking by creating a set of new theoretical and practical frameworks for deeper representations of the pedestrian in the urban space and within a larger transportation system. The three articles presented in this dissertation outline an alternative, human-centered representation of the pedestrian, providing theoretical, methodological, and practical solutions to conceptualize how soft variables such as emotion, motivation, and especially cognition influence the practices of walking. / 10000-01-01