1. From The City of To-morrow and Its Planning (1929)
LE CORBUSIER
‘A Contemporary city’
From The City of To-morrow and Its Planning (1929)
Iulia Munteanu
MPA I, NGO Management

2. (Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris)
Le Corbusier
(Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris)
( ) - Swiss-French Architect, city planner, designer, painter, writer and philosopher;
one of the pioneers of the Modernist Movement (International Style) in architecture;
his designs for modern houses – “machines for living”

3. A Contemporary City Of Three Million Inhabitants
“the skyscraper in the park”- idea today ubiquitous
Plan Voisin presented in Paris in 1922 → controversial
rows of identical, strictly geometrical skyscrapers→ Right Bank (Paris)
the city of today!

4. Site Population level site – ideal site for contemporary city citizens
suburban dwellers
mixed sort
→ define areas to be allotted to the 3 sections

5. Areas proposed: The City – business and residential centre
The Industrial City
The Garden Cities – workers’ houses
legal establishment of a protective zone between industrial city and garden cities
Population – more dense, small distances to cover → increase density

6. Traffic
3 types: heavy goods traffic + lighter goods traffic + fast traffic
→ 3 kinds of roads:
- below ground – for heavy traffic
- at the ground floor level
- arterial roads for fast one-way traffic
cross-roads = enemy to traffic
tramway – shouldn’t exist in modern city

7. The Plan of the City Basic principles:
decongest the centres of the city
augment city density
increase the means for getting about
increase parks and open spaces
gridiron system- streets every 400 yards

8. main arteries for fast traffic run N-S and E-W → elevated roadways
great open space at the base of skyscrapers
around the city – protected zone (green fields)
garden cities – form a wide encircling band
right at the centre of city→ railway station:
landing platform (aerodrome) + mezzanine +
ground floor + ‘basement’ + ‘sub-basement’ + ‘sub-sub-basement’

11. The city
24 skyscrapers – only for business purposes → 10,000 to 50,000 employees
residential blocks – 600,000 inhabitants
garden cities – 2,000,000 inhabitants or more
open space → squares, gardens, theatres, restaurants, cafes, museums, shops, sports grounds, public services, universities;
protected zone – building prohibited → reserved for the growth of the city

12. Further principles and City aesthetics
city of today is dying for it is not geometrical
We must build in the open!
achieve uniform lay-out of city → result of true geometrical lay-out is repetition → standard, a perfect form
to introduce uniformity into the building, we must industrialize building
A city made for speed is made for succes!