A Theory of The City As Object

URBAN DESIGN International (2002) 7, 153179
r 2002 Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. 1357-5317/02 $15.00

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A theory of the city as object: or, how spatial laws mediate

the social construction of urban space
Bill Hillier*
Space Syntax Laboratory, The Bartlett School of Graduate Studies, University College London, Gower Street,
London WC1E 6BT, UK
A series of recent papers (Hillier et al, 1993; Hillier, 1996b, 2000) have outlined a generic process by which
spatial configurations, through their effect on movement, first shape, and then are shaped by, land-use
patterns and densities. The aim of this paper is to make the spatial dimension of this process more precise.
The paper begins by examining a large number of axial maps, and finds that although there are strong
cultural variations in different regions of the world, there are also powerful invariants. The problem is to
understand how both cultural variations and invariants can arise from the spatial processes that generate
cities. The answer proposed is that socio-cultural factors generate the differences by imposing a certain local
geometry on the local construction of settlement space, while micro-economic factors, coming more and
more into play as the settlement expands, generate the invariants.
URBAN DESIGN International (2002) 7, 153179. doi:10.1057/palgrave.udi.9000082
Keywords: society; city design; axial maps; formal typologies; cultural invariants and variations
Movement: the strong force

The urban grid, in the sense used in this paper, is
the pattern of public space linking the buildings
of a settlement, regardless of its degree of
geometric regularity. The structure of a grid is
the pattern brought to light by expressing the grid
as an axial map1 and analysing it configurationally. A series of recent papers have proposed a
strong role for urban grids in creating the living
city. The argument centres around the relation
between the urban grid and movement. In
Natural movement (Hillier et al, 1993), it was
shown that the structure of the urban grid has
independent and systematic effects on movement
patterns, which could be captured by integration
*Correspondence: Space Syntax Laboratory, The Bartlett School
of Graduate Studies, 1-19 Torrington Place, University College
London, London WC1E 6BT, UK. Tel: +44 (0) 171 391 1739, Fax:
+44 (0) 171 813 4363,
E-mail: [email protected]
1
An axial map is the least set of longest lines of direct
movement that pass through all the public space of a
settlement and make all connections.
analysis of the axial map2. In Cities as movement

economies (Hillier, 1996b) it was shown that
natural movement and so ultimately the urban
grid itself impacted on land-use patterns by
attracting movement-seeking uses such as retail
to locations with high natural movement, and
sending non-movement-seeking uses such as
residence to low natural movement locations.
The attracted uses then attracted more movement
to the high movement locations, and this in turn
attracted further uses, creating a spiral of multiplier effects and resulting in an urban pattern of
dense mixed use areas set against a background of
more homogeneous, mainly residential development. In Centrality as a process (Hillier, 2000), it
was then shown that these processes not only
responded to well-defined configurational properties of the urban grid, but also initiated changes
in it by adapting the local grid conditions in the
2
The 1993 paper dealt only with global or radius-n analysis,
but a series of studies since then have shown that local or
radius-3 integration is normally a better predictor of pedestrian movement.
The city as object

B. Hillier
154
mixed movement areas in the direction of greater

local intensification and metric integration
through smaller scale blocks and more tripefficient, permeable structures.
Taken together, the three papers describe aspects
of a generic mechanism through which human
economic and social activity puts its imprint on
the spatial form of the city. The papers do not deal
with the patterns of activity themselves, but the
theory seems to work because, regardless of the
nature of activities, their relation to and impact
on the urban grid is largely through the way they
impact on and are impacted on by movement.
Movement emerges as the strong force that
holds the whole urban system together, with the
fundamental pattern of movement generated by
the urban grid itself. The urban grid therefore
emerges as a core urban element which, in spite of
its static nature, strongly influences the long-term
dynamics of the whole urban system. In the light
of these results, we can reconceptualise the urban
grid as a system of configurational inequalities
that is, the differences in integration values in the
lines that make up the axial map which
generates a system of attractional inequalities that
is, the different loadings of the lines with built
form densities and land-use mixes and note
that, in the last analysis, configuration generates
attraction.
Space-creating mechanisms
The three papers cited describe a process that
goes from the spatial configuration of the urban
grid to the living city. But what about the grid
itself? Is this arbitrary? Would any grid configuration set off the process? The aim of this paper
is to try to answer this question. It will be argued
that urban grid configurations are far from
arbitrary, but in fact are themselves the outcomes
of space-creating mechanisms no less generic than
the space-to-function mechanisms described in
the three cited papers. The argument runs as
follows. If we examine a large number of axial
maps, we find well-defined invariants as well as
obvious differences. What process, we must ask,
can produce both. The answer proposed is that
the invariants arise from a combination of two
things. First, in spite of all their variability, there
are certain invariants in the social forces or more
precisely in the relations between social forces
that drive the process of settlement aggregation.
URBAN DESIGN International
Second, there are autonomous spatial laws governing the effects on spatial configuration of the
placing of objects such as buildings in space, and
these constitute a framework of laws within
which the aggregative processes that create
settlements take place. The social forces working
through the spatial laws create both the differences and the invariants in settlement forms. The
link between the two is again movement, but
whereas the space-to-function mechanism was
driven by the effect of spatial configuration on
movement, the space creating mechanism is
driven by the influence of movement on space,
and so can be considered a function-to-space
mechanism.
The concept of spatial laws is critical to this
argument, so we must explain what this means.
Spatial laws, in the sense the term is used here,
does not refer to universal human behaviours of
the kind claimed, for example, for the theory of
human territoriality (as reviewed in VischerSkaburskis, 1974), but to ifthen laws that say
that if we place an object here or there within a
spatial system then certain predictable consequences follow for the ambient spatial configuration. Such effects are quite independent of human
will or intention, but can be used by human
beings to achieve spatial and indeed social effects.
Human beings are bound by these laws in the
sense that they form a system of possibilities
and limits within which they evolve their spatial
strategies. However, human agents decide independently what their strategies should be. Like
language, the laws are then at once a constraining
framework and a system of possibilities to be
exploited by individuals.
In fact, it seems likely that human beings already
intuitively know these laws (although they
cannot make them explicit), and can exploit them
as agents to create social effects through spatial
behaviours at a very young age. Consider
the following true story. A group of people are
sitting in armchairs in my daughters flat. My
two-year-old grandson Freddie comes into the
room with two balloons attached to weights by
two pieces of string about two and a half feet long,
so that the balloons are at about head height for
the sitting people. Looking mischievous, he places
the balloons in the centre of the space defined by
the armchairs. After a minute or two, thinking
Freddie has lost interest, one of the adults moves
the balloons from the centre of the space to the
The city as object

B. Hillier
155
edge. Freddie, looking even more mischievous,

walks over to the balloons and places them back
in the centre of the room. Everyone understands
intuitively what is going on, including you. But
what is actually happening?
The answer is that by placing an object in the
centre of a space we create more obstruction to
lines of sight and potential movement than if
we place it at the edge. This is the principle of
centrality set out in the theory of partitioning in
Chapter 8 of Space is the Machine (Hillier,
1996a, b). If we place a partition midway on a
line, it creates more and more evenly distributed
gain (added distance in summing shortest trips
from all points to all others) in the universal
distance (the sum of distances from each point to
all others) than if we place it peripherally (in
which case the depth gain is more unevenly
distributed, but is overall less). Because this must
apply to lines in all directions, it follows that
it will also work for objects placed in space. An
object placed centrally in a space will increase
universal distance and interrupt intervisibility
more than one placed at the edge. Now it is clear
that Freddie not only knows this in the sense
that he can make use of this knowledge in
behaviour, but it is also clear that he can use this
surely theoretical knowledge of space to
achieve social ends, namely drawing attention to
himself and away from the adults engaged in
conversation. It is also of course clear that we
know this about space in the same way as
Freddie, but it is also clear as professionals that it
is unlikely that we were taught this vital principle
of space in architecture school or in maths class.
What is proposed here is that spatial laws, driven
by social forces, account for exactly and only the
spatial invariants of cities3. The form of the paper
will be to: examine axial maps and develop an
account of their invariants as well as their
differences; outline and demonstrate the spatial
laws in question; apply these to what will
be called the basic generative process by which
urban-type spatial systems arise; and develop a
theory of how the impact of the spatial laws on
evolving settlements is driven by two kinds of
social forces, which can be broadly termed
the socio-cultural and the micro-economic. It is
3
In this sense, the argument is still within the spirit of the
theoretical framework set out by Martin and March in Urban
Space and Structures in 1972.
proposed that culture is a variable and puts its

imprint mainly on the local texturing of space,
generating its characteristic differences, whereas
micro-economics is a constant and puts its
imprint mainly on the emerging global structure
of the settlement in a more or less invariant way.
The reason one works locally and the other
globally is due to the ways in which each uses
the same spatial laws to generate or restrain
potential movement in the system.
This is why we find in axial maps both differences
in local texture, and invariants in the global
patterning. The combination of the spatial laws
and the dual processes explains why axial maps
read as a set of similarities and differences. The
paper concludes with a discussion of the relation
between socio-economic and spatial laws, suggesting that although the creation of the space of
the city is driven by socioeconomic processes it is
not shaped exclusively by them. Equally fundamental in shaping city space are autonomous
spatial laws that generate more or less equifinal
outcomes from varying processes4.
Differences and invariants in axial maps

First, let us consider some axial maps. By far the
most obvious differences between them are
geometrical. On reflection, that is all they could
be. Axial maps are no more than sets of lines of
different lengths with different angles of intersection and different degrees and kinds of intersection (for example, a line can either pass through
another or stop on it). Axial maps from different
parts of the world tend to differ in all these
properties. Figures 14 show four fairly characteristic axial maps from different parts of
the world arranged from the most to the least
geometric: Atlanta (USA), The Hague (Holland),
Manchester (UK) and Hamedan (Iran). It is
easy to see that the impression of more to
less geometric arises because the axial maps
differ substantially on the basic properties
of axial maps. Each has its own distinctive range
of line lengths and angles of the incidence, and
its distinctive intersection characteristics. For
4
The question What about planned towns? may of course
be raised here. However, in the great majority of cases the
planned element is only the first stage of an urban growth
process that then will be subject to the same lawful influences
as cities which have grown through a distributed process.
The city as object

B. Hillier
156
Figure 3.
Figure 1.
Figure 4.
lines) is very marked at all levels. In The Hague,

this is found locally but much less so at the global
level. In Manchester, this is hardly found globally,
and what there is locally is much more broken up
than in The Hague. In Hamedan, it hardly exists
either at the global or local levels, except in the
central public areas of the town.
Figure 2.
example, if we use the patterns of intersection, we

find that in Atlanta, the tendency for lines to pass
through each other (rather than to end on other
Differences in the range of line lengths and angles

of incidence seem to follow the intersection
differences. Atlanta has a number of very long
lines approximating the radius of the system, and
long lines can be found in most parts. At the same
time large areas of the grid maintain a strict rightangle intersection with a northsouth orientation,
The city as object

B. Hillier
157
Table 1
Usa
euro
uk
arab
Cities
Avg. Lines
Conn
Loc Int
Glob Int
Intel
12
15
13
18
5420
5030
4440
840
5.835
4.609
3.713
2.975
2.956
2.254
2.148
1.619
1.610
0.918
0.720
0.650
0.559
0.266
0.232
0.160
Conn connectivity; Loc Int local integration; Glob Int global integration;
Intel intelligibility.
although with a striking offset grid in the historic

centre. In The Hague, the longest lines tend to be
less than the radius of the system, and in general
long lines are peripheral to discrete local groups
of lines. A less strong right-angle discipline is
maintained, there is greater variety in the orientation, and long lines, especially radials, tend to
intersect to others at very obtuse angles. In
Manchester, the long lines are nearly all radials
well below the radius of the system. The tendency
for the long radials to have near-straight continuations is even stronger, and the local rightangle discipline is even looser. In Hamedan, the
longest lines are only a fraction of the radius of
the system and tend to be found towards the
periphery of the system. Even so there is a clear
radial structure formed by lines of the second
length rank, and intersecting with greater angular
change than in the other cases. Locally, we find a
whole range of angles of incidence including
near-right-angle connections, but in most cases
one line tends to stop on another.
These geometric differences are also consistently
reflected in syntactic differences.
Table 1 shows the syntactic average for 58 cities
taken from four parts of the world. Each regional
group of cities, in spite of differences within the
subsamples, has its own characteristic set of
syntactic parameters.
What is the reason for these geometrical and
syntactic differences? Why should lines in Iranian
cities be, on average, markedly shorter than lines
in, say, English cities, or why should European
cities have a degree of geometric organisation
somewhere between UK and American cities,
or Arab cities be less intelligible than European
cities. On the face of it, the differences seem
to be expressions of what we might call spatial
culture. For example, in cities in the Arab world,
the spectrum between public and private spaces
is often quite different from that in European

cities. In historic European cities, we find that
local areas are for the most part easily permeable
to strangers, with public spaces in locally central
areas easily accessible by strong lines from
the edge of the area. At the same time, fronts
of dwellings are strongly developed as facades
and interface directly with the street both in terms
of visibility and movement. In many Arab
cities, strangers tend to be guided much more to
certain public areas in the town, and access
to local areas is rendered much more forbidding
by the more complex axial structure. At the same
time, dwelling facades are much less developed,
and the interface with the street tends to be
much less direct both for visibility and for
movement. The differences in the geometry of
the axial maps seem to be a natural expression of
these differences. Even in the case of American
cities, where one of the main factors in creating
the more uniform American grid is thought to be
the need to parcel up land as quickly and easily as
possible to facilitate economic development, we
note that the grid was prior to economic development and should therefore be seen as a spatial
cultural decision to create and use space in a
certain way.
However, in spite of these differences, there are
also powerful invariants in axial maps that seem
to go across cultures and even across scales of
settlement. One of the most striking is the
statistical distribution of line lengths. Although
we find great variations in the average and range
of line lengths, we invariably find:
that the axial maps of cities are made up of a
small number of long lines and a large number
of short lines;
that this becomes more the case as cities
become larger; and
that in general the distribution of line lengths in
cities approximates a logarithmic distribution.
The city as object

B. Hillier
158
Figure 5.
Figure 5 shows the four cities of Figures 14

with the distribution of line lengths on the left
and the logged distribution on the right5.
In practical terms, this means that if, for example,
we divide the range of line lengths into 10, we
find that in Atlanta 92.7% of lines are in the decile
of shortest lines and only 2% in the eight longest.
In The Hague, the figures are 84.8 and 5%, and in
Manchester 85.9% and less than 3%. In the much
smaller case of Hamedan, we find that 90% of the
lines are in the four shortest deciles and only 2%
in the five longest. Looking more widely, we find
that in London (15,919 lines) 93.3% of lines are in
the shortest decile and less than 1% in the top
eight deciles. In Amsterdam (7996 lines) on the
face of it a more griddy city the figure is 95.8%
in the shortest decile and again less than 1% in the
top eight. In Santiago (29,808 lines), an even more
grid-like structure, the figure is 94.7%, again with
1% in the top eight, while in Chicago (30,469
lines), a city we think of as wholly grid-like, the
figure is 97.6% with only 0.6% in the top eight. It
is not always quite so high in large cities. In
Athens (23,519 lines), for example, the figure is
86%, with 2.3% in the top eight. However, even in
5
In some cases, such as Chicago and Amsterdam, we find a
loglognormal distribution. However, the difference between a
log and a loglog distribution is much greater than that between
an unlogged and logged distribution, so these differences are
not pursued here.
the strange pre-Columbian city of Teotihuacan the

figure is 85%.
If we look at a smaller system, we find the same
tendency, although less marked. In Venice (2556
lines), for example, the figure is 76.3% with 4% in
the top eight; in Shiraz (1971 lines) in Iran, where
lines are on average shorter than in Western cities,
71.7% are in the shortest decile and 8.3% in the
top eight. In the English cities of Nottingham,
Bristol and York, the figures for the shortest decile
are 78, 63 and 55%, respectively. Even in much
smaller systems, we can find a strong tendency
in this direction. If we take Old Paranoa, the
informal settlement built by the workers who
constructed the dam in Brasilia (de Holanda,
1977), we find that 32% of the lines are in
the shortest decile and 68% in the shortest two.
In the southern French town of Apt, 41% are in
the shortest decile and 59% in the shortest two,
while in Serowe (a self-generated settlement in
southern Africa) 32% are in the shortest decile and
68% in the shortest two. Even in a small area
within London we find 24% in the shortest decile
and 53% in the shortest two.
As settlements grow, then, the proportion of lines
that are long relative to the mean for the
settlement becomes smaller but the lines
*Note: Only selected images have been printed along with the
text here.
The city as object

B. Hillier
159
themselves get longer. This seems to be invariant

across all cultures in spite of the strong geometric
differences we have noted. A plot of the log of
the number of lines against the proportion in the
shortest decile for 20 settlements from small to
very large, showing an r2 of 0.802 (p 0.0001)5.
This also applies to different-sized chunks of the
same city. If we plot the percentage of lines
in the shortest decile against the number of axial
lines for four different-sized cutouts from the
London axial map, showing an r2 of 0.923,
p 0.0391. However, even the smallest cutout
the City of London with only 565 lines (as
opposed to 15919 for the largest system) has
70% of lines in the shortest decile, and approximates a logarithmic distribution.
Why then are line lengths distributed in this way
and, in particular, what is the role of the small
number of long lines? A useful clue comes from
looking at their spatial distribution. If we take the
lines in the longest quintile of the range and make
them the darkest lines in the axial map, we find a
marked tendency for the longest lines to be centre
to edge lines starting at some distance from the
original centre. Figure 6 shows the pattern for
London, and Figure 7 for Athens. The second rank
of lines, however, shows a different pattern in
each case. In London, the second-rank lines form
a continuous and relatively dense network penetrating most parts of the grid. In Athens, the
second-rank lines pick out discrete grid-like areas
with relatively poor connections between them. If
we were to look at, say, Baltimore, the secondrank lines tend to be linked directly to the first
rank of lines, forming a tree-like distribution in
Figure 6.
Figure 7.
the system as a whole. These patterns suggest that

the first rank of lines reflects generic properties of
city growth while the second rank indicates
differences in the relation of global to local.
This hint of global invariants and local differences
is reinforced if we look at the syntactic analysis of
the axial maps. If we take the four cities shown
in Figures 14 and analyse them for radius-n
integration (for example, Figure 8), we find in
each case that in spite of the geometric differences
a certain kind of structure is adumbrated: each
city has an integration core the patterns formed
by the darker which links a grid-like pattern of
lines at the heart of the city almost to the edge in
all directions either by way of quasi-radial lines or
extended orthogonal lines, in some cases reaching
the edge line but in others falling short. Within the
interstices formed by this overall lighter areas are
found, often with a darkish line as a local focus. In
other words, in spite of the geometric differences,
each city has, when seen as a system of configurational inequalities, a certain similarity of
structure. This is the pattern we call the deformed wheel: a hub, spokes in all main directions, sometimes a partial rim of major lines, with
less integrated, usually more residential, areas in
the interstice forms by the wheel. This generic
pattern was first identified as a deep structure
common to many small towns, seeming to occur
in spite of topographic differences (Hillier, 1990).
It was also found as a local area structure in
London, where named areas such as Soho or
Barnsbury typically took an area deformed wheel
form with the London supergrid (the main
The city as object

B. Hillier
160
Figure 9.
Figure 8.
radials and their lateral links) forming the rim of

the wheel.
As a global pattern, the deformed wheel holds up

remarkably well in larger cities for example, in
London, Athens and Baltimore. The pattern is
even found in very different kinds of cities. If
we look at Venice (Figure 9) without the canals,
for example, we find that in spite of its very
idiosyncratic history having grown together
from several islands rather than from a single
origin we still find a very marked deformed
wheel pattern, even though the wheel is much
less easily recognisable than in most cases. Or
looking at Tokyo, which is by far the largest
system ever analysed, we find a remarkable and
even more complex version of the wheel pattern
with several layers of rim which, with the sinuous
radials, produce a quasi-grid covers a large part of
the system. Even the strange pre-columbian city
of Teotihuacan shows, at least a partial realisation
of the deformed wheel pattern. Again this near
invariant of cities is found in spite of the
substantial differences in syntactic values that
were shown in Table 1.
In addition to these space invariants, we also find

that if we look at settlements in terms of the size
and shape of blocks, then we find if not invariants
then at least a set of pervasive tendencies, once
again set against a background of substantial
geometric differences by region (which we may
therefore expect to have a cultural origin of some
kind). These can be seen fairly easily in the axial
maps of Figures 14, and even in the analysed
axial maps, but is perhaps easier to see in black
on white figure ground maps of a Turkish city
analysed by Sema Kubat shown in Figure 10. The
most obvious near invariant is an underlying
tendency for blocks to be smaller and more convex
at or near the centre and larger and less convex
towards the edges (Hillier, 2000). However, if we
relate block size and shape to the patterns shown
by integration analysis of the axial map, we find a
subtler pattern. The lines forming the spokes of the
deformed wheel tend to be lined with larger than
average (for the settlement) blocks for most of their
length, but smaller than average blocks in the
centre (the hub of the wheel).6 In contrast, the
areas interstitial to the core tend to have block
sizes between these two extremes. In other words,
the distribution of block sizes seems to reflect
the distinction between global and local structure.
This is to some extent the case in all the settlements shown so far.
6
This phenomenon is also found in subcentres. In Centrality as
a process (Hillier, 2000), it was argued that wherever movement is convex and circulatory (ie moves around in a locally
two-dimensional grid as eg in a shopping centre) rather than
linear and oriented (as in moving through an urban grid from
an origin to a destination), then metric integration was the key
property in understanding both the movement pattern and the
type of spatial configuration that tended to emerge under these
conditions.
The city as object

B. Hillier
161
the patterns arise from a largely distributed or

bottom-up process, that is, from multiple interventions by many agents over time. Even if single
agencies are involved, then even so the fact that
settlements evolve over such long periods implies
that the process of settlement generation must be
regarded as an essentially distributed one. What
kind of distributed process, then, can produce
such dual emergent phenomena?
Figure 10.
Let us first note an important difference between

variants and invariants: the variants tend to be
local and the invariants global. Now consider
a case where a city has grown under the influence
of at least two different cultures: Nicosia.
Figure 11 is an analysed axial map of the historical
core of Nicosia in Cyprus (a city sadly now
divided). The north-east quarter is a historic
Turkish area, the south-east a historic Greek area.
The differences in the texture of the grid are
marked, with the two areas having quite different
geometries and different emergent topologies: the
Greek area has longer lines, more lines passing
through each other, a different pattern of angle of
incidence, and, as a result, much more local and
global integration (and a better relation between
the two) than the Turkish area. Since these
differences reflect typical differences found between systems in Europe and the Islamic world, it
is reasonable to regard these as socio-cultural
differences in the basic geometry of space.
However, when we analyse the area as a whole
we find a typical deformed wheel pattern has
somehow arisen over and above these geometrical differences, even though the differences between the Greek and Turkish areas show up
strongly as differences in the degree of integration.
Figure 11.
Socio-cultural relativities and

economic universals
We are faced then with a puzzle. The processes
that generate the axial maps and block maps of
cities seem at the same time to produce variants,
in the form of systematic differences in settlement
geometry and syntax from one region to another,
and also invariants. What kind of process can
produce both? It seems highly unlikely that these
dual patterns are in any sense designed in,
although of course they may be in some cases.
However, the fact that most settlements evolve
over long periods compels us to the view that
We thus see what appear to be two processes

operating in parallel: one a local process generating differences in local grid patterns and apparently reflecting differences in spatial culture in
some way; and the other a global process
generating a single overriding structure that
seems to reflect a more generic or universal
process of some kind. A clue to this comes from
the simple fact that the less integrated areas
generated by the local process are largely residential, and it would be natural to think of these
as the primary distributed loci of socio-cultural
identities, it being through domestic space and its
environs (including local religious and cultural
buildings) that culture is most strongly reproduced through the spatiality of everyday life. A
The city as object

B. Hillier
162
second clue comes from the fact that when we

analyse settlements syntactically, it is the microeconomic activity of markets, exchange and
trading that is most strongly associated with the
ntegration core, religious and civic buildings
being much more variably located (Loumi, 1988;
Karimi, 1998; Hillier, 2000). In this, of course, the
integration core of public space also reflects the
spatiality of everyday life, but in this case it tends
both to the global, because micro-economic
activity in its nature will seek to extend rather
than confine itself, and also to be culturally
nonspecific, in that it is in these activities, and
therefore these spaces, that people mix and
cultural differences are backgrounded.
This suggests a natural explanation for the dual
production of variants and invariants in urban
grids. On the one hand, a residential process
driven by socio-cultural forces puts its imprint
on local space by specifying its geometry and
generates a distinctive pattern of local differences,
because culture is spatially specific. On the other,
a public space process driven by micro-economic
activity generates a globalising pattern of space
that tends to be everywhere similar because
micro-economic activity is a spatial universal.
This is the critical difference between the two
aspects of the settlement creating process: the
socio-cultural component is idiosyncratic and
local while the micro-economic component is
universal and global. It is this that creates the
underlying pattern of differences and invariants
that we find everywhere in settlement forms.
This is the key conjecture of this paper: that the
processes that generate settlement forms are
essentially dual, and through this duality generate the invariant pattern of local differences and
global similarities that characterises settlement
forms. The question then arises: why should
socio-cultural life generate one kind of spatial
pattern and micro-economic life another? The
answer, it will be proposed, lies in the fact that the
relation between micro-economic activity and
space, like the relation between culture and space,
is largely mediated by movement, but microeconomic economics in a universal and global
way, culture in a local and specific way. In what
follows we will therefore look at spatial and
movement aspects of both socio-cultural and
micro-economic processes and how they affect
each other as a settlement grows.
The basic generative process

We can begin by noting that there is also a set of
low-level invariants, or near-invariants, in urban
space, which are so commonplace as to be rarely
remarked on, but which are the very foundation
of what a settlement is. These are
that most spaces are linear, defined by the
entrances of buildings or groups of buildings
on both sides;
that buildings are clumped together to form
discrete islands;
so that the linear spaces surroundings the
islands form intersecting rings and create an
overall system of continuous space (a street
pattern of some kind); and
that this is a highly nondendritic configuration, that is a pattern that is everywhere ringy
rather than tree-like.
The simplest process for generating spatial configurations with these properties has been familiar since the earliest days of space syntax: the
restricted random beady ring process that generates small ring street settlements of a kind
found in many parts of the world (Hillier and
Hanson, 1984). The process starts with a dyad
composed of a cell (representing a notional
building) and a piece of open space linked by an
entrance so that those inside can come and go into
the outside world. These dyads aggregate randomly apart from two restrictions: that each open
cell must join full-facewise onto one already in the
system (joins of closed cells arise only randomly);
and no vertex joins for closed cells are allowed
(people do not build corner to corner)7.
The pattern on the left of Figure 12 is a typical
product of such a process. A beady-ring-type
pattern is produced on the way, but this is not our
main concern here. The overall pattern is that a
system of outward facing islands of built forms
varying in size and creating more or less linear
spaces forming intersecting rings has emerged
from the process. No one designed this. It has
emerged by a process that finds a pathway of
emer-gence by which a global pattern appears
7
In the version of the process set out in The Social Logic of Space,
the open space of the dyad was the same size as the built cell.
In the version shown here, this has been retained, but the built
cells have then been expanded without expanding the open
spaces, with the effect that the scaling of open spaces and
buildings approximates real systems more closely.
The city as object

B. Hillier
163
Figure 12.
Figure 13.
from the actions of local agents. A key element of

the urban system has thus emerged in the form of
a continuous system of open space, permitting
interaccessibility from each part of the settlement
to all others.
there were none except to the south). Second,

when we look at the synergy scattergrams, we
find that the r2-between local (radius-3) and
global (radius-n) integration is much better than
in the generated case in spite of the fact that it
lacks the discipline of an underlying grid. In other
words, Paranoa and Serowe both display a
relation between local and global structure that
needs to be explained.
The pattern thus has enough of the key topological settlement-like properties (although it lacks
their geometric properties but see below) for us
to think of it by Ockhams razor perhaps as the
basic generative process for spatial patterns of a
generically urban kind. But it does not yet look at
all like a real settlement. What is missing? It
cannot be just the over- regularity due to the fact
that the process has been generated on a regular
grating. The fault seems to lie mainly in the
geometry of both its block structure and its line or
axial structure: blocks are insufficiently compact
and lines are insufficiently varied in length. So let
us look at two real settlements that seem to have
grown by something like this process and see
what they have in addition. Figure 13 is the old
self-generated settlement of Paranoa, developed
from the encampment of the workers who built
the dam for the lake behind Brasilia (de Holanda,
1997). Figure 14 is the settlement of Serowe in
south-west Africa in which the built elements are
actually compounds. On the right are radius-n
integration maps of each, and the synergy scattergram plotting the correlation between local and
global integration. On the right of Figure 12 is the
same analysis of the computer-generated pattern.
Two points are of particular interest. First, something like the deformed wheel integration core
exists in both real cases (and in the case of
Paranoa cannot be explained in terms of existing
routes in the direction of other settlements, since
Experiments with random lines

We can explore these differences further by
experimentation. We first construct a more or less
random rectilinear grid made up of lines that vary
in length only a small amount, on average about
half the diameter of the overall settlement. The
scattergram gives an r2 between connectivity and
integration of over 0.88,9. We then retain the same
mean and range of line length but grow the system
to twice its size. Its diameter is now about three
times the mean line length. The intelligibility r2
falls to 0.5. We do the same again, increasing the
size of the system until its diameter is about four
times the mean line length. The r2 falls to below
0.3, as in Figure 15.
It is not difficult to work out what is happening. If
integration analysis is carried out on a system
8
Old Paranoa has now been pulled down by the planning
authorities and replaced by a much more regular settlement.
9
The intelligibility correlation between connectivity and
global integration is used here rather than the synergy
correlation between local and global because the systems are
initially too small to respond realistically to local integration
analysis. The argument would however hold up for synergy
analysis.
The city as object

B. Hillier
164
If, we then take four lines near the centre and

extend them to a length of about 0.75 of the
diameter of the system, the effect on both the
integration core and the scattergram is immediate
and dramatic. The core, not surprisingly, begins to
go from centre to edge and the scattergram
improves from below 0.3 to above 0.6. However,
the scatter is highly non-urban, in that the four
new lines are quite distinct from the rest of the
system. But in Figure 16, an r2 of .86 is achieved
with a pattern of lines that links laterally at
the edges as well as from centre to edge: the
characteristic deformed wheel structure. In this
axial map, 47% of lines are in the shortest decile
and a further 29% in the next shortest, almost
identical to Paranoa, where the respective figures
are 52 and 25%.
Figure 14.
with uniform elements much smaller than the

system itself say a tessellation of square cells
then integration will focus on the geometric centre
and fall off towards the edges. As soon as you
specify a system with more or less similar
dimensions, in this case similar line lengths, then
the same must happen. As the system becomes
larger, integration will increasingly concentrate in
the centre. The consequences for the intelligibility relation between line connectivity (which is
closely related to length) and integration are that
relatively longer and therefore better connected
lines will be randomly distributed through the
system, while integration will be concentrated in
the centre. The more this happens, the less the two
will correlate and the more the local properties
of the system give a poor guide to the global
properties hence unintelligibility.
This suggests that the essential function of the

longer lines against the background of shorter
lines is, as we might expect, to give some kind of
global structure to the overall pattern, with the
local structure fitted into its interstices. However,
two further points must be added. First, we also
find that the pattern of long to short lines is
critical not just to the global structure but also
to the relation between the local and global
structure. This suggests that the long to short
distribution is pervasive at all levels of the
settlement and its growth, and therefore needs
to be understood as an outcome of a growth
process rather than as one of imposition of a
global structure. In other words, we need to
Slope = 3.9489
Intercept -0.0111
R^2 = 0.2979
Connectivity
Mean = 3.6964
Integration
Mean = 0.9389
7.0000
Connectivity
1.3355
Integration
Figure 15.
The city as object

B. Hillier
165
Slope = 8.2506
Intercept -11.2848
R^2 = 0.8755
Connectivity
Mean = 5.7477
Integration
Mean = 2.0644
19.0000
Connectivity
3.4641
Integration
Figure 16.
understand how the required distribution of line

lengths can be produced at every stage of an
aggregative process of settlement growth.
Regularities in the configurational

effects of placing objects
How then can we modify the basic generative
process to create these outcomes at every level, so
that the growth process will tend to create not
only a pervasively lognormal distribution at every
level, but at the same time generate an intelligible
and synergic system with a deformed wheel-type
structure? The answer proposed is that it is here
that spatial laws intervene, driven by the dual
socio-cultural and micro-economic forces imposing on space their different requirements for
potential movement.
The laws in question govern the effects on spatial
configuration of the placing objects (such as
buildings) in space. The laws initially govern
the degree of metric integration in the system
measured as the universal distance10 from each
cell in the complex to all others (as opposed to a
specific distance that measures distance from one
10
For an account of the idea of universal distance see Space is

the Machine, Chapter 3. Universal distance is probably the most
fundamental concept in space syntax. It can be applied either
metrically or topologically, and allows the redefinition of an
element in a system as no more than a position from which
the rest of the system can be seen, thus nearly dissolving the
elements. (see Space as paradigm in the Proceedings of the
Brasilia Space syntax Symposium).
cell to one other). The mean universal distance in

a complex is thus isomorphic to the mean length
of the trip by shortest paths within the complex. It
is through their effect on mean trip lengths that
these laws are activated and govern the evolution
of the urban object.
The laws are essentially clarifications, simplifications and fuller demonstrations of the principles
of partitioning set out in Chapter 8 of Space is the
Machine. There it was shown that every time a
partition is placed in a system, it has a predictable
effect on universal distance within that system.
In that text, four partitioning principles were
proposed for the minimising or maximising of
depth gain in a system, depth gain being the
increase in universal distance due to the placing
of a partition. The principles were: centrality
partitioning a line in its centre creates more depth
gain than partitioning it eccentrically; extension
partitioning a longer line creates more depth gain
than partitioning a shorter line; contiguity
making partitions contiguous increases depth
gain more than making them discrete; and
linearity arranging contiguous partitions linearly
increases depth gain more than coiling them up,
as, for example, in a room.
In what follows it will be proposed that these four
principles11 can be reduced to two laws, one
dealing with the relations of spaces and the other
11
On reflection, what were noted in Space in the Machine were

empirical regularities, since no theoretical account was offered
as to why they should be so.
The city as object

B. Hillier
166
DEFINING DEVIATION, d
line of movement
line of movement
For a single unit sized block the total deviation required to go round it is 2 additional unit cells
line of movement
line of movement
For a 3*1 block placed lengthwise along the line of movenment, the total deviation is still two
additional unit cells, since the section of the deviation that is parallel to the line of movement
adds no additional distance
line of movement
line of movement
For a 3*1 block placed sideways on the line of movement, a further 2 units of distance are
added for each unit of distance the deviation requires from the line of movement
Figure 17.
with the relations of objects. Before we introduce

these laws however, we will show how these
partitioning regularities can be interpreted for
cellular aggregates. The basic notion we work
with is that of a pair of cells (or boundaries)
forming the two ends of a line, and a third cell
which we wish to place between them. The
method for calculating the gain in universal
distance is as in Figure 17. Consider a line of
n+1 cells with an object placed somewhere along
it leaving n cells in some distribution on the two
sides of the cell with at least one cell on each side.
A deviation, d, will be the unit distance around
the object that must be added to straight line
movement to go from any cell to any other on the
other side of the object. D will be the sum of ds
that are needed to go from all cells to all others, or
the total added to the universal distance on that
line by the placing of an object.
If the object is square and its sides are the same
size as the unit of distance for measuring along
the line, as in the top case in Figure 17, then d will
always be 2 units of distance. Here we refer to
the 2-unit deviation as a single d. Note that if an
object with, say, shape 3 1 is placed on the
line lengthwise, then, as in the middle case in
Figure 17, d for negotiating that object will always
be 2 units regardless of the length of the unit,
because the trip between the two deviation units
is parallel to the original line. If, however, the
3 1 object is placed orthogonal to the line of
movement (see the bottom case in Figure 41), then

a further two units of distance, that is one further
d, will be added for every parallel line blocked by
the object.
Figure 18 illustrates the principle of centrality: if
we want to place a cell (the light cell top left)
between two existing cells (dark), does it make a
difference where we place it? The answer (midleft) is that the more peripherally we place it, the
less the increase in universal distance, and
the more centrally we place it, the greater the
increase. It follows (bottom left) that if we place
cells evenly along lines, the increase in universal
distance is greater than if we make some gaps
large and others small. It also follows (mid-right)
that an object placed in the centre of a space will
increase universal distance more than one place
towards the edge (because the effect on two
dimensions will be the sum of linear effects). The
principle of extension also follows: if we place
a block on a longer line, it increases universal
distance more than if we place it on a shorter line.
Figure 19 illustrates the principle of contiguity:
cells joined contiguously increase universal distance more than those placed discretely. Finally,
Figure 20 illustrates the principle of linearity:
contiguous cells arranged linearly increase universal distance more than if they are placed
compactly. It should be noted that these principles
interact. For example, in a finite space placing
one cell contiguously with another will locally
The city as object

B. Hillier
167
Figure 18.
Do we minimise depth gain by making blocks contiguous or discrete ? The answer is that other
things being equal, contiguous blocks will always create more depth gain than discrete blocks.
2
4
4
4
total depth gain in the immediate

neighbourhood: 20 for 7 cells
4
4
8
2
6
total depth gain in the second

2
6
4
4
2
6
6
2

10
4
4
8 8
2
4 4
4 4
4 4
8 8
4 4

4
4
4 4
12 16 12
6 8 6
8 8

10
4
4
12 16 12
12 16 12
6 8 6
2
4
4

8 8
4 4
4
4
12 16 12


This is the principle of CONTIGUITY: the more we make blocks contiguous, the less integrated the surrounding space
Figure 19.
increase distance but will also expand the space

between the composite object and the boundary,
thus reducing universal distance.
The impact of these laws on grids can be explored
by constructing experimental grids made up of
metrically uniform cells (they can be as small as
we like, as long as they are uniform), and
calculating the mean universal distance, or mean
trip length, for each. Figure 21 sets out a series of
experiments with grids each with 301 metrically

uniform cells. The cells are circular in order
to avoid the effect of corner joins. Each grid thus
has the same number of metric cells and therefore
the same number of distance elements. Differences between grids are therefore purely to do
with the rearrangement of the cells into different
configurations. In some cases, the rearrangement
has left one cell that cannot be located in the grid.
In each of these cases the cell has been added to
The city as object

B. Hillier
168
Given that blocks are contiguous, do we minimise depth gain by making them linear or compact ? The answer is that the more linearly
contiguous blocks are arranged, the more depth gain
4 4
2
6
4 4
total depth gain in the

immediate neighbourhood: 32
8 8
8 8
8 8
8 8

neighbourhood: 128
6 6
4 4
4
8 12 12 8
2
8 8 6

8 8
8 8
8 8
8 8
8 12 12 8
16 6

12
16 24 24 16
12 16 12
16 24 24 16
32 12 4 4
4 4
4 4
4 4
16 24 24 16
16 24 24 16
12 12 16 16 12
12 16 16 12


This is the principle of COMPACTNESS: the more compact we make contiguous blocks, the more we increase the integration of the
surrounding spaces
Figure 20.
Figure 21.
the same position in the grid, namely the

intersection of the third column (counting from
the left) and the third row (counting from the top).
Experiments with the sensitivity of the grid to
the addition on one overlaid cell show that an
additional cell overlaid in the centre of the
uniform regular grid reduces the mean universal
distance by 0.1% (it will of course slightly increase
the total since there is an additional cell), while
overlaying it on a corner cell increases it by 0.2%.

These differences are then one or two orders of
magnitude less than the effects of configurational
changes below, and so can be discounted.
Using the regular uniform grid (Grid A) as
the benchmark, we can then vary the configurations of grids to illustrate the effect of the
four principles. In Grids B and C for example,
The city as object

B. Hillier
169
we illustrate the centrality principle by placing

a block initially in the centre and then in the
corner, while standardising the layout of the
cells displaced from the centre. Placing the block
in the centre increases the universal distance
of the grid by 2.6%, while placing it in the corner
reduces it by 0.3%. In Grid D, we take this
further by reducing the scale of blocks in the
centre at the cost of increasing them at the edge (a
common form in the centre of towns, as noted in
Centrality as a process (Hillier, 2000)). The mean
universal distance is reduced by 6.3%. If we do
the opposite and make the centre block as large as
possible, and place the small blocks at the edges
(the number of small blocks remains the same, as
in Grid E), we increase the mean universal
distance by 13.9%, making a total difference
between Grids D and E of just under 20%.
In Grid F, we take Grid E and create a cross
link through the centre. The effect is to increase
mean universal distance by 9.1% compared to
Grid A, but to reduce it by nearly 5% compared to
Grid E.
We then illustrate the principle of extension. In

Grid G we displace each vertical segment of cells
between grid intersections one cell to the right
and then to the left on alternate rows. We thus
shorten all internal vertical lines with more or less
neutral effects on block sizes. The effect is to
increase mean universal distance by 4.2%. In Grid
H, we break all horizontal lines close to the centre
vertical, creating a pair of lines of fairly equal
length at each level. The increase in mean
universal distance is 1.6%. However, when we
break the horizontal line near the edge vertical in
Grid J, thus keeping some lines as long as possible
at the expense of others becoming much shorter,
the mean universal distance increases by only
0.5%, three times less than with a more central
break in the lines.
The principle of compactness is illustrated in Grid

K by converting the square central block of Grid B
into a linear block of equal area. The effect is to
increase the universal distance by 6.2% compared
to 2.6% for the square block. We then illustrate the
principle of contiguity by splitting the linear block
into two in Grid L. The increase in universal
distance is 1.7% compared with Grid A, but
of course it is nearly four times less than for the
contiguous linear block.
These grids are illustrative of course rather than

a proper test, because huge combinatorics are
involved, and in complex situations the four
principles will interact. For example, in Grid M,
we break many lines, and also make many smaller
blocks in the centre. The result is a decrease in
universal distance of 1.9% compared with Grid A
in spite of the shortening of lines.
The law of centrality

It is now proposed that these four principles can
be reduced to two formally demonstrable laws: a
law of centrality and a law of compactness. The
law of centrality proposes that an object placed
centrally in a space will increase universal
distance more than one placed peripherally.
Consider again the line of n+1 cells with an object
placed somewhere along it leaving n cells in some
distribution on the two sides of the cell with at
least one cell on each side. Wherever we place the
object, D for one side of the line must be equal to
D for the other, since each cell acquires one d for
each cell on the other side of the object. (see
Figure 18 mid-left). For example, if there are x
cells on one side of the line and y on the other,
then on one side D will be x*y and on the other
y*x. To establish D then, we need only establish it
for one side of the line, since we may then
multiply by 2 to get the total for the whole line.
We therefore work by calculating D as the sum of
ds for one side of the line.
Suppose then that the object is placed centrally on
the line. It will then have equal numbers of cells
on either side. Let m ( (n1)/2) be the number
of cells on each side of the object. Each of m cells
on one side then requires one deviation to go to
each of cells on the other, giving a total of m*m or
m2 deviations for each side. The total deviations,
D, for the line with a centrally placed object, c, is
then 2(m2) or m2 for each side:
Dc 2m2
Now move the object one cell sideways. The total

deviations for one side will then be (m1)(m+1)
and for the other (m+1)(m1) or 2(m1)(m+1)
for the whole line. Now m24(m1)(m+1) is a
necessary inequality, as for example 3242*4 or
4243*5. Similarly, (m1)(m+1)4(m2)(m+2) is a
necessary inequality, as 2*441*5 or 3*542*6. In
general: for D(c1c2ycn representing steps away
The city as object

B. Hillier
170
from the central location

2
m 4m xm x4m x 1
m x 1
with x 0 for the central object case

(m0)(m+0) m2. It follows that the greater the
x, that is the farther the object from the centre,
then the smaller is the product of (mx)(m+x). In
other words, the farther the object from the centre,
the lower the total D.
One way to think of this is geometrically. The
perimeter of a rectilinear shape is the sum of its
sides. Holding the perimeter of the shape equal,
the area of the shape, that is the product of its
longest and shortest side, is maximised when all
sides are equal and reduces as we shorten one
side and lengthen the other, eg 4*4 16, 5*3 15,
6*2 12 and 7*1 7 as in
In a sense, then, the law of centrality replicates the

behaviour of areaperimeter ratios, even though
we are dealing with linear effects.
In practical terms, this means that in a growing
cellular aggregate such as a settlement, when
faced with a choice of placing an object somewhere between two other objects, we should
always place it close to one object and far from
the other if we wish to minimise the gain in
universal distance in the system as a whole. This
means that gain-minimising decisions will always
tend to create long and short lines rather than
lines of similar length. This is clearly the case
where a partitioning is made along an existing
line, so that the two newly created sub-lines are
colinear (ie share the same alignment). However,
it is clear that it will also be the case for lines that
are not colinear. The lower depth gain from a long
and short line is not created by the rule but by the
situation created by the rule. It has arisen from the
intrinsic properties of a longer and shorter line
compared to a pair of equal lines, and in fact the
lower depth gain from the long and short line in
fact results from the existence of the longer line,
even when offset against a shorter line which was
the by-product of its creation. If longer lines are
beneficial even when offset by a colinear short
line, it follows that a longer line will be beneficial
anywhere even when it is not so offset by a

colinear short line. It follows that to minimise
depth gain in a system we should always
conserve longer lines at the expense of shorter
lines. This is the principle of extension always
conserve long lines and partition shorter ones
and it thus follows as a corollary of the law of
centrality. A second corollary is that placing two
objects equidistant from each other and from
other objects will increase universal distance more
than placing them either close to each other or
close to other objects, since the former will create
many equal short lines, while the latter will create
some longer and some shorter lines. In general,
we may say that placing objects in proximity to
each other increases universal distance less than
placing them farther apart12.
The law of centrality thus addresses the fundamental spatial problem of settlement: how to
aggregate built forms in such a way as to preserve
the interaccessibility which is potentially interrupted by those built forms, and how to maintain
this as the settlement grows. It leads to a
fundamental idea in the generation of settlement:
that to minimise universal distance in the system
(ie to maximise metric integration) the fundamental strategy must be always to conserve
longer lines, if necessary at the expense of
creating other short ones.13
The law of compactness

The law of compactness proposes that the more
compact an object or group of objects, that is, the
more its shape approximates a circle (or for
12
This may be demonstrated with greater clarity in an
unbounded system such as a torus. Consider two objects
placed on the surface of a torus. The two objects have two
distances from each other: a distance from one face of the
object to the nearest face of the other object; and a second
distance from the opposite face of the first object to the
opposite face of the second object the other way round the
torus. These distances may either be equal or different. If they
are equal that is the objects are the farthest possible distance
apart in any direction then the law of centrality shows that
the increase in universal distance is maximal. The more the
objects are moved together to create a nearer and a farther
distance, the more we have a shorter and a longer distance and
therefore the less the increase of universal distance. It follows
that placing objects close to each other in an unbounded
system increases universal distance less than placing them
farther apart.
13
Also variation in the scale of the attached space will have
substantial effects on the axial map.
The city as object

B. Hillier
171
practical purposes a square), then the less

the increase in universal distance in the surrounding space. This may be shown by first considering
the effect, as before, of placing an object on a line
of n+1 cells. We know that the maximum increase
in universal distance for each side is m2
(m (n1)/2) for the case where the object is
placed centrally. If we then place a discrete object
on a second line with at least one line between the
new and old line, then the gain on the second line
will also be m2, since the objects do not affect each
other (see Chapter 8 of Space is the Machine, for a
discussion of the case where lines are neighbours). In general, the depth gain for single
discrete objects placed on distinct lines will be
2(m2) or n(m2), where n is the number of lines. The
rate of increase is therefore linear.
Now suppose that the objects are placed contiguously on neighbouring lines. This creates a
more complex situation in terms of depth gain,
which is illustrated in Figure 20. As we can see,
depth gain is least at the edges and greatest in the
centre. With m being the length of the line blocked
and n the length of the partition ( the number of
lines blocked), the depth gain can be calculated by
the finite series
D n2 m2 n 22 m2 n 42 m2 . . .
2
n n m2
which gives a third-order polynomial function

for the increase in universal distance with either
increased partition length or line length. It
can then be compared to the linear rate for
discrete cells. If blocks are discrete, then universal
distance increases linearly, and if contiguous the
increase is a third-order polynomial function with
increasing contiguity. This demonstrates the old
principle of contiguity. However, as we will see
below, we must also unify this with the idea of
compactness.
Consider the effect of an aggregate of objects
forming an overall shape placed on a regular grid
of lines. The shape will increase universal
distance in two directions in the grid, which we
can think of as horizontal and the vertical.
Holding m, the length of the line on either side
to the shape, constant, the increase in universal
distance in one direction will be a third-order
polynomial function of n, the number of contiguous cells composing that face of the shape.
Alternatively, we can hold n constant and vary m,
with the same result. These calculations will not
be affected by the number of cells on the adjacent

side of the shape, since these will only increase
universal distance in the other, orthogonal direction. The overall increase in universal distance
resulting from the imposition of the shape of the
grid will then be the sum of the effects on each
direction of the lengths of the two different faces
of the composite object blocking that direction
calculated by formula (3) applied independently
to both directions.
Suppose then that the sides are equal, that is the
object is maximally compact, say 2 2:
Holding m constant at, say, 3, the gain in universal

distance will be 2(n2m2) 2(2232) 72 for each
direction (made up of the two half-lines), or
4(n2m2) 144 for the whole object.
Now alter the shape of the object to a 1 4:
The gain in the vertical direction will now be

(4232)+(2232) 180 for each half-line, *2 for the
pair of half-lines 360. That in the horizontal
direction will be 2(1232) 18 for the pair of halflines. The total gain is then 378 compared to 144
for the square object. In fact, if we reduce the
object to a linear block of three cells:
then we have 2((3232)+(1232)) 180 for the vertical

direction and 2(1232) 18 for the horizontal
direction, giving 208 which is still greater
than 144.
The reason for the increase is simple. Since m is
constant, n is the only variable in equation (3).
When the block is square then D 2n2. However,
if we replace the square object with a rectangular
object, say, (n1) on one side and (n+1) on the
adjacent side, then all we need to know is the
relation between (n1)2+(n+1)2 for the two unequal half-lines of the rectangular object and 2n2
for the two equal half-lines of the square object.
Since (n1)2+(n+1)2 (n22n+1)+(n2+2n+1) 2n2+2,
it follows that (n1)2+(n1)242n2 and that in
The city as object

B. Hillier
172
general
2
n x n x on x y
n x y2
From this it follows that a compact form will

always generate less depth gain than an elongated
form of equal area, and that the difference
increases rapidly with increased elongation. As
with the law of centrality, a simple geometrical
idea underlies the law of compactness.
Impact of the laws on the basic

generative process
How then do the spatial laws impact on the basic
generative process? We have already seen that the
social forces driving settlement formation are
dual, with a residential component, driven by
socio-cultural forces, and a public space component, driven by micro-economic forces. These
correspond to a duality in the settlement form
itself, with the invariant deformed wheel global
structure formed by the public space process and
the culturally specific interstitial local background
areas formed by the residential process. We also
note that there is a duality in the spatial laws, in
that the compactness law addresses the physical
component of the settlement, that is the size and
shape of aggregate objects (ie blocks), while the
centrality law addresses the spatial component,
that is length of lines, distance of objects from
each other, and so on. We recall that the output of
the basic generative process in Figure 12 was
deficient in both respects: blocks were overly
varied in their shape and lines were insufficiently
varied in their length. Our task was to explain the
differences between the computer-generated
model and the real cases by showing how the
dual social processes impacted on the basic
generative process through the intermediary of
the spatial laws.
Two conjectures can now be proposed. The basic
generative process guaranteed interaccessibility
but it did not specify its degree or type, that is, it
did not specify a more or less integrated process
or a particular local geometry. To control this, one
would need in the first instance to set a parameter
for the compactness law regulating the size and
shape of blocks, by specifying, for example, for
how long and where one could continue adding
to an existing block and when a new one had to be
started. Such a parameter would in effect specify
how the compactness law would influence the

pattern and degree of universal distance in the
background structure of the system in general.
The first conjecture is that it is this local
interaccessibility parameter controlling the generic block structure and operating through the
compactness law that is set by the residential
process and its socio-cultural drivers. It is through
this that the characteristic local geometry of space
is created in the first instance in the background
residential areas of the settlement. Where this is
set differently by different cultures, we find the
kind of differences noted in the different parts of
Nicosia (Figure 11). Where it is more homogeneous, we generate the kinds of generic regional
differences in axial geometry that are indexed in
the geometric and syntax values (Table 1) set out
earlier.
The second conjecture is that with the growth of
the settlement (and in fact in quite early stages)
the public space process, led by micro-economic
activity, sets a global interaccessibility parameter
working through the centrality law. Since microeconomic activity is by nature integrative, this is
not a variable, but a constant. Its effect is always
to seek to conserve longer lines and to use these
to minimise universal distance in the larger scale
system. Since the effects it seeks are spatial, it
operates directly on space and therefore works
through the centrality law. The public space
process thus tends to generate the local-to-global
deformed wheel structure at whatever level of the
settlement it is applied, including, where it is
operative, local area structures. However, this is
not all the micro-economic process does. In its loci
of most concentrated activity it will generate not a
linear system that minimises universal distance in
the system as a whole, but a locally intensified
grid that minimises movement from all origins
to all destinations in the local region (see, for
example, the central area of Konya in Figure 10)
(Hillier, 1999a, b).
Looking at Konya, we can now see the settlement
plan in a new light. We can see how spatial laws
driven by the dual process have created the key
features of the layouts: a deformed wheel global
structure, an intensified grid forming the hub
of the wheel, and the background of residential
areas. However, there is an important respect in
which the processes that create these patterns can
be seen as a single process. The operation of the
centrality law is dual, in that it creates both
The city as object

B. Hillier
173
integration and segregation. In this it is capable of

reflecting in itself the fundamental duality of the
socio-cultural and micro-economic processes. The
socio-cultural process, which creates the larger
areas of background space in the city, is always a
matter of imposing some restriction on integration and the natural co-presence that follows it
through movement, while the micro-economic
process operates of necessity by always maximising integration (minimising universal distance) in
order to maximise natural co-presence in its
spaces. The micro-economic process therefore
naturally occupies that part of the duality of the
law of centrality which generates the longer lines
and the essential structure of the settlement, while
the socio-cultural process equally naturally occupies the obverse side, the production of a larger
number of shorter lines which construct the less
integrated background of mainly residential space
in the interstices of the global structure. Through
the dual nature of the centrality law, then, the
dual process acquires a single expression.
These conjectures require of course a whole
research programme to test them, involving both
simulations of settlement growth and on the
analysis of real cases. However, some useful
preliminary indications have been gained by
some simple experiments with the impact of the

centrality law on the basic generative process
(using at this stage a manual process). For
example, once we know the law of centrality, we
can use it to maximise universal distance in a
restricted random process by having a rule which
requires the blocking of the longest line whenever
an opportunity presents itself. Figure 22 is a
manually generated outcome from applying this
rule within the basic generative process. The
outcome pattern is primarily composed of short
lines, and (for the reasons given earlier) has very
poor and unurban local to global synergy of .147,
about as low as it can get for a small system). It
also lacks the kind of global structure typically
found in settlements, although it does begin to
show signs of an interesting, but overly peaked,
log distribution of line lengths (Figure 23). In
short, it shows little sign of the spatial invariants
of settlement we are looking for. In some ways, it
is the opposite. Suppose then that we use the
centrality law in the opposite direction, and set up
a rule that forbids blocking a line once it has
acquired a length of, say, five cells. This generates
a pattern of many more long lines, as in Figure 24,
which does have a good synergy score (0.820), but
the lines do not construct a deformed wheel
pattern with interstitial local areas, and as Figure
Figure 22.
The city as object

B. Hillier
174
Figure 25.
Figure 23.
Figure 24.
Figure 26.
25 shows the approximation of a log-normal

distribution is quite poor.
Suppose then we apply the centrality law in the
simplest and most localised way by setting up a
rule that says that wherever you are adding a
built form to the aggregate you have to choose a
local location which preserves the locally longer
line, but at the cost of continually creating shorter
lines. Figure 26 is an outcome of such a process.
Its global structure is overly biased towards the
central horizontal line, but it is centre to edge, and
the local areas are insufficiently structured in
relation to the global core (giving it an urban
synergy score of 0.729), but it does even at this
stage of growth begin to look more like the lognormal distribution of line lengths, as in Figure 27.
This suggests that it may indeed be the duality of
the centrality law in creating many shorter lines to
compensate for each longer one that is in the last
analysis responsible for the log-normal distribution of lines lengths in real settlements. However,
Figure 27.
although the tendency of the micro-economic

process to use the longer line output of the
centrality law seems to be invariant, the relations
between these two aspects of the dual process
should perhaps be seen as a variable. Sometimes,
for example, the zones of background residential
space seem to be no more than the by product of
The city as object

B. Hillier
175
the micro-economic process, while elsewhere

Konya would be an example there is a conscious
parametrisation of the obverse side of the dual
processes to create quite substantial regions of the
urban grid, sometimes quite distant from the
main settlement structure. In other cases, such as
London, we find the local areas are much more
closely related to the global structure, more
axially integrated into it, and themselves have
local to global deformed wheel structures.
This kind of variation suggests a rudimentary
typology of settlement forms based on the
different balance between the micro-economic
and socio-cultural forces. Where the economic
process is dominant from the beginning, we find
linear or cross-road settlements and these are
usually found on major routes between larger
towns, a linear town being global structure only.
A deformed grid town is one in which both
processes run in parallel. A regular orthogonal
grid town is one in which the local cultural
process is in the spatial image of the global
economic process, as in mediaeval planted towns
or early American towns, and where the whole
grid is essentially a micro-economic rather than
socio-cultural creation, as can reasonably be said
both of mediaeval planted towns and early
American grids14.
We may then be within striking distance of
grasping aspects of the pervasive logic by which
apparently different social forces generate invariants in their settlement patterns as well as the
more obvious differences. The key issues are the
parametrisation of the cultural process which
defines the local spatial geometry, and the balance
between this and the emerging micro-economic
process as the settlement grows. In the early
stages of growth, the local socio-cultural process
guarantees interaccessibility in the emerging
settlement pattern but little more. It sets a
parameter which by deciding the degree or ease
of interaccessibility (ie more or less universal
distance) specifies the local geometry of the
settlement, covering both line length, angles of
incidence and block size all factors in interaccessibility. With growth, the universalistic and
14
Such economic grids need however to be distinguished
from the grids of administrative, garrison or ceremonial towns
which characteristically are not pure grids but interrupted
grids in which many lines, including some major lines, are
interrupted by the facades of major public buildings at right
angles.
therefore globalising micro-economic process increasingly interposes on this process a simple

depth minimising mechanism for each built form
placing decision: conserve long lines, if necessary
at the expense of creating many shorter lines. This
will have the effect of generating a pattern of a
few long lines and many short lines, and because
the choices are regional this will be the case at
every level that is, this process will generate the
pervasive log-normal distribution with a few long
lines and a large number of short ones at every
level. Changes in this fundamental pattern of
growth will reflect essentially the changing
balance between micro-economic and cultural
forces, and this may (as historically in London)
alter with the passage of time, with each alteration
leaving its mark on the settlement geometry.
However, the core issue is that the inherent
duality of the spatial law of centrality is able to
reflect the duality of these potentially conflicting
social forces, and turn what is initiated as a dual
process into a single process by which the locally
highly differentiated and globally highly structured pattern of urban space come into being.
A reflection
The deformed wheel structure with its interstitial
areas the classic, although not the only, urban
form seems thus to be a product of an essentially
metric process, optimising metric integration in
some aspects, restraining it in others. Some may
have noticed that this leads to a difficult question.
Why should we continue to regard axial maps as
topological structures, to be analysed through
their graphs, when we have shown that they are
generated through an essentially metric process?
Would we not be likely to arrive at a better picture
of the city if we subjected the axial map to metric
analysis? It has already been suggested that the
intensified grids found in centres and subcentres
are best understood through metric integration
analysis (Hillier, 2000). Is it not time to subject the
axial map as a whole to such an analysis, or at
least to a metrically sensitive analysis? In this
way, we could surely counter one of the main
objections to the axial map as a basis for graph
analysis: that the nodes of the graph represent
unequal elements.
The problem is that as soon as we introduce a
metric dimension to an axial map whether by
The city as object

B. Hillier
176
using an analysis based on metrically uniform

elements, or by weighting, say, line segments for
length configurational analysis produces not an
enhanced version of the kind of picture given
by the line graph analysis, but a very different
picture: one that essentially picks out geometric
centrality in the system, as we saw when we used
more or less uniform line elements in the pseudosystem shown in Figure 15. If we applied this to a
city like London, it would have the effect that a
short alley off Oxford Street would seem to be
more integrated than, say, the Holloway Road. In
one sense it is of course, since it is closer to the
geometric centre of London. However, in a more
important sense we would seem to be losing one
of the most important aspects of the integration
analysis of the urban system: the substitution of a
picture of geometric centrality by a picture of
centrality in the line topology, one that identifies
geometric centrality but then draws it out towards
the edges of the system in all key directions, and
even including parts of the edges of the system.
The question is then: which is the true picture. Is
the one brought to light by the radius n analysis of
the line graph in some sense identifying properties that are truly of the nature of the urban
system and essential to its functioning? One thing
is clear. Metric analysis of a large-scale system is
very much poorer in its capacity to postdict the
movement structure. In experiments carried out
in 1986 (Hillier et al, 1986) on axial maps whose
segments were weighted for length and used as
the units of analysis, this very propensity to
assign too high a movement prediction to lines
adjacent to strong lines and too low a prediction
to syntactically stronger but more remote lines,
destroyed the normal approximate agreement
between integration and movement. This suggests
that the axial map, analysed as a line graph, might
after all be capturing something that is of the
essential nature of the urban system.
What can this be? There are two aspects to a
possible answer: one substantive and to do with
urban reality, the other cognitive and to do with
how we interact with urban reality. Substantively,
the empirical effect of the line inequalities in the
urban system is to create a disjunction between
geometric centrality in the system and topological
centrality in the line map. In effect, centrality
is topologically stretched from the geometrical
centre to form links with the edge in all directions.
In doing so it also structures the object by creating
a relation between the local and the global

organisation. The benefits of these are obvious
enough: strangers are provided with easy-to-read
routes from edge to centre and out again, and the
system acquires local to global intelligibility and
synergy. In contrast, it is easy to see that a system
without the line inequalities in the right place and
of the right type will degenerate into a labyrinth.
In fact, in terms of the micro-economic processes
that create the deformed wheel structure, we find
an even stronger argument when we consider the
settlement not in isolation but as part of the wider
system of settlements. Figure 22 illustrates what
in Chapter 9 of Space is the Machine was called the
paradox of centrality. On the left are three
notional settlements, each with its own internal
integration core. But when (on the right) we join
them into a single system and analyse the
integration pattern for the system of settlements,
we see that integration shifts to the edges of the
settlements. Clearly, if we consider each settlement on its own, then the internal pattern of
integration will approximate the internal movement structure, while if we consider them as a
system of settlements the edge pattern will reflect
movement in the overall system.
This is of course exactly what happens in real
settlements. Movement patterns invariably have a
local aspect and a global aspect, the former
reflecting circulation within the system, the latter
movement in and out of the system. Insofar as
movement is driven by the micro-economic
process, it generates both the intensified local
grids of the centres and subcentres by reflecting
the need to minimise distance from all points to
all other points within the zone, and the linear
links from the local to the global scale of the
settlement, reflecting the need to minimise distance from certain points to certain others at the
larger scale (Hillier, 1999a, b), including into and
out of the system. Over time, this tension between
the internal and external movement economies of
the settlement is the fundamental reason why
centrality tends to shift towards the edges of the
settlement, unless strenuous efforts are made to
inhibit it.
The deformed wheel structure is the key mechanism for this inhibition. In Figure 22, we draw four
national settlements, each with a deformed
wheel case linking edge to centre (top left). Top
right, we connect the edge lines of the four. The
The city as object

B. Hillier
177
core goes to the edge of each. Bottom left, we

link centre to edge lines to each other. The core
penetrates into, but not across, the settlements.
Bottom right, we extend the centre to edge lines
into neighbouring settlements. The internal cores
of each are nearly restored.
Cities as discrete geometries

The second reason why we might suspect that the
axial map captures essential properties of the
urban system is cognitive. The analysed axial map
seems to approximate the intuitive picture we
have of an urban system to an unexpected degree.
A simple reason for this would be that human
beings are excellent judges of simple linear
distances when, for example, throwing a stone
or a spear, or a ball of paper into a waste paper
basket. However, this comparatively secure judgement of distance quickly breaks down when the
system becomes nonlinear and involves changes
of direction. This would make simple sense in
evolutionary terms. Distance is a comparatively
sophisticated and recent concept, and there is no
obvious reason why we would expect to judge it
as well in the highly nonlinear situations created
by human settlement as when we are dealing with
distance as a simple extension of bodily reach.
Complex spatial systems seem then to be dealt
with cognitively through something more elementary. What might this be? The obvious
candidate is discrete geometry: that we cognise
complex spatial systems like cities as assemblages
of interrelated geometrical elements rather than as
complex patterns of metric distance (Goodman
and ORourke, 1994). Discrete geometry is the
application of the techniques of discrete mathematics such as graph theory to systems of discrete
geometric elements, such as lines, convex spaces
and visual fields. Space syntax, we now can say
with hindsight (there was not much discrete
geometry about when we started), is the application of discrete geometry to architectural and
urban systems considering these first and foremost as systems of space.
If our cognitive representations of complex space
are indeed discrete geometrical, then the strongest
candidate as the element in the discrete geometry
would be the line. Lines have the two key
properties of being both very simple and very
global. All we need to know is how far we can see
from a point. Put more theoretically in terms of

the city as a total visibility field we can follow
Penn (and adapting Peponiss beautiful concept
of informational stability as those regions in a
spatial system that do not change topologically
with movement (Peponis et al, 1997)) in arguing
that a linear clique (a set of points which can all
see each other) preserves informational stability
for longest for moving individuals and thus offers
the most economical although not the most
complete picture of an overall system (Penn,
2001). Other discrete geometrical representations,
such as visibility graphs (Turner et al, 2001) for
example, give a much more complete account of
the complexities of urban space, but it is not
obvious that they would form the basis of a
cognitive representation of the city as a whole.
There is too much local information for the global
picture to be clear. An axial map maximises local
simplicity as a means to picturing global complexity. With visibility graphs, it is the other way
round. Analysis of how we give directions in
complex spatial systems (Hillier, 1999a, b) suggests that the axial maps may not be too far from
the way we represent them to ourselves, that is as
a matrix of lines where changes of linear direction
are the key items of information that become
organised into the whole picture.
If we intuit the spatial structure of the city as a
discrete geometry, then it is reasonable that we
should analyse it by treating the discrete elements
as the nodes of a graph. We are tempted to add
to this: that we represent the urban system to
ourselves not simply as a discrete geometry, but
as a simplified discrete geometry, in the sense that
a series of near straight lines of the kind that are
commonly found in cities (Hillier, 1999a, b) are
internally represented as a line, so that the whole
system comes to resemble an approximate grid. If
this is the case, then it would be no more than a
case of the imposition of a Euclidean framework
on non-Euclidean inputs as argued by Petepan
and her collegues commenting on (Okeefe and
Nadel, 1978)
ythe hippocampus appears to impose a
Euclidean framework on non-Euclidean inputs
OKeefe and Nadel (1978), who see in this
process an instantiation of a Kantian a priori
notion of absolute spaceywe propose that in
distorting the sensory inputs, theses spatial
maps impose an order and a structure that
The city as object

B. Hillier
178
our spatial conceptual representations require

y(Peterson et al, 1996)
Since it is also the line topologies that seem to
correlate with movement in the different parts of
the system, it seems hard to avoid the conclusion
that the line representation of the city is not just a
convenient simplification but something that
touches the essential nature of the city. This does
not mean that it cannot be improved or broken
down more than it is now. However, it does seem
likely that any future configurational analysis of
the large-scale structure of cities will need to
include some representation of its linear dimension as currently expressed, although perhaps
crudely, in the axial map.
With or without the axial map, this account of
how urban space is generated has unavoidable
implications for how we model the city. Models in
the past have used the fundamental concept of
mass and the Newtonian mathematics of gravitational attraction as the guiding theoretical entities.
The integration equations play the same role in
configurational models as the Newton equations
do in attraction-based modelling. But they do so
on the basis of a discrete geometrical representation of the spatial structure itself, one that seems
to engage the key role of visibility in how we
cognise and interpret our surroundings. This has
a further implication: as Chiron Mottram has
argued (Mottram, 2001), configurational models
are light-based rather than mass-based: they
reflect the world we see rather than the world of
distance and mass. The question is: how far do
these cognitive realities intervene in the functioning of the urban system? On the evidence so far, it
seems unlikely that we can arrive at a theoretical
model of the city without them.
Axial maps are to be credited as follows:
Atlanta: Mark David Major

The Hague: Laurie Neale
Manchester: Polly Fong
Old Hamedan: Kayvan Karimi
London: Chang Hua Yoo
Chicago: Mark David Major
Shiraz: Kayvan Karimi
Venice: Erica Calogero
Teotihuacan: Ruben Garnica
Apt: Ricky Burdett
Serowe: Glenn Mills
Paranoa: Frederico de Holanda
Amsterdam: Xu Jianming
Santiago: Margarita Greene
Athens: Valentina Karvounzi
Nottingham: Mark David Major
Bristol: Kayvan Karimi
York: Kayvan Karimi
City of London: Julienne Hanson
Baltimore: Shazir Shah
Tokyo: Shinichi Iida & Masaki Nishibori
Nicosia: Konstantinos Kypris
Acknowledgements
Thanks are due to Sema Kubat for permission to
use the black on white map of Konya.
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URBAN DESIGN International (2002) 7, 153179

r 2002 Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. 1357-5317/02 $15.00

A theory of the city as object: or, how spatial laws mediate

Movement: the strong force

analysis of the axial map2. In Cities as movement

The city as object

mixed movement areas in the direction of greater

The city as object

edge. Freddie, looking even more mischievous,

proposed that culture is a variable and puts its

Differences and invariants in axial maps

URBAN DESIGN International

The city as object

lines) is very marked at all levels. In The Hague,

example, if we use the patterns of intersection, we

Differences in the range of line lengths and angles

The city as object

although with a striking offset grid in the historic

is often quite different from that in European

The city as object

Figure 5 shows the four cities of Figures 14

URBAN DESIGN International

the strange pre-Columbian city of Teotihuacan the

The city as object

themselves get longer. This seems to be invariant

the system as a whole. These patterns suggest that

The city as object

radials and their lateral links) forming the rim of

As a global pattern, the deformed wheel holds up

In addition to these space invariants, we also find

The city as object

the patterns arise from a largely distributed or

Let us first note an important difference between

Socio-cultural relativities and

We thus see what appear to be two processes

The city as object

second clue comes from the fact that when we

The basic generative process

The city as object

from the actions of local agents. A key element of

there were none except to the south). Second,

Experiments with random lines

URBAN DESIGN International

The city as object

If, we then take four lines near the centre and

with uniform elements much smaller than the

This suggests that the essential function of the

The city as object

understand how the required distribution of line

Regularities in the configurational

For an account of the idea of universal distance see Space is

cell to one other). The mean universal distance in

On reflection, what were noted in Space in the Machine were

URBAN DESIGN International

The city as object

with the relations of objects. Before we introduce

movement (see the bottom case in Figure 41), then

The city as object