Barcelona is one of the densest cities in Europe. And Márton Mogyorósy’s recent photo series, called Barcelona from above, does an excellent job of demonstrating that. My favorite photo is this one here, showing La Barceloneta neighborhood adjacent to the beach:
None of the buildings are particularly tall (maybe 6 or 7 storeys at the most), but the streets are probably only about 6m wide, including sidewalks. This is one way that you can achieve density without height and it is a good example of what I was getting at in my post, European-style height, but not density.
I like this in theory, but I wonder if it only works at southern latitudes? Do people on the lower floors ever get sunlight? I know that’s an issue in Paris on the narrower side streets. The Northern European cities seem to strike a good balance between density and ensuring light hits the ground for at least part of the day, helping people through the long winters and perhaps more critically helping to melt the snow.
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There is also a lot of innovative planning/re planning of the way the streets will work in the Eixample neighbourhood which is already interesting in the way it is planned for solar access and courtyards and diamond intersections etc. . They are turning a number of the smaller blocks into superblocks and limiting or stopping through traffic in many places. Have a look..especially item 7 https://latitudefortyone.com/the-visionary-urban-design-of-the-eixample-district-barcelona/
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