Abstract:
The increasing pressures of urbanisation and population growth are transforming many of the world's predominantly low and medium-rise cities, such as cities in China, into high-density, high-rise residential and working environments. This rapid growth has triggered the destruction of established neighbourhoods and open, public spaces for commercial developments and infrastructure. These new developments ignore the original urban fabric, and cause the degradation of urban environment, cultural identity and the quality of public space which has led to the lack of community vitality on the street. (Shi, 2008) Often, high-rise buildings are detached from the surrounding environments like a standalone object and do not integrate into the wider urban life. The compartmentalised nature of the internal spaces created by stacking homogenous floor plans on top of each other results in a loss of sense of community and a degrading and estranged experience for the inhabitants. (Yeang, 2002) This thesis aims to deter such negative results of urbanization by studying the possible combination of programs and spaces within a high-rise structure and come up with a solution that will recreate the satisfying aspects of life on the ground level and create a more socially integrated urban environment that provides a high quality of urban living and an increased quality of public life and a sense of community.