Back-alley as Community Landscape

Abstract

Long considered to be anachronistic elements of a bygone way of life and neighborhood structure, alleys have recently reappeared in design proposals by “new urbanist” planners. These planners generally see alleys as repositories for unsightly service elements and functions within the neighborhood, but overlook the potential of the alley to serve a much broader purpose in the support of neighborhood activities that perhaps can only occur in the interior or back spaces of the residential block. Older (pre-WWII) alley-inclusive neighborhoods often give evidence of this potential; their alleys can be seen as diverse landscapes which function ably as service corridors but attract and support a great range of non-service community use. In addition, case studies of new developments appear to support the notion that the design and structure of modern alleys bear directly upon their ability to foster a similar diversity of neighborhood activities.

Through the vehicle of case studies of both behavior and place, the author has examined three distinctly different residential back-alleyscapes in order to explore the relationship between the built forms of the alley and the “behavioral landscape” which has emerged within these forms. Following this examination, the author proposes a reconsideration of basic contemporary alley structure. In this reconsideration the author restructures the alley so that its potential to serve diverse contemporary community needs might be more fully realized.