AR6141
Arsitektur Budaya dan Pembangunan
Program Studi Arsitektur, Institut Teknologi Bandung
Generative Algorithms as a Design Tool in the Transformative
Urbanism of Bandung
Hafiz Amirrol & Chichi Asda Artha
Abstract — In the era of transformative urbanism that
needs a new totalizing concept in generating good
values in the life practices of its inhabitants,
alternative design approaches are needed to respond to
these phenomena. This is due to the fact that these
phenomena and conditions will be transformed into
possibilities that would affect Bandung’s built
environment and its values of good life practices in
the future. A more flexible and reflexive approach in
designing the city (macro) and its architecture (micro)
are new demands that must be responded by those
involved in the practice of the built environment.
Generative algorithms tools made possible by
parametric technology are seen as one of the many
possibility that would help to generate alternative
design approaches in responding to this issue. The
complex variables of cultural and daily life practices
of the inhabitants of a specific place were used as
inputs for the metric parameters used in the generative
algorithms tool. This paper is to delineate new design
approaches and techniques that are hoped may
contribute positively in responding the complex
transformative conditions of Bandung. By conducting
research and analysis on the phenomena of urban
transformation, the objective of this paper is to
provide a visionary thinking through best practices
approaches and methods on how to intervene the city.
Furthermore, the flexibility and capability of the
generative algorithms tool is deemed viable for further
design explorations and also acts as a liberator against
homogeneity for future architectural and urban design
works.
Keywords : generative algorithms, urban transformation,
parametric design, Bandung, cultural studies
I. INTRODUCTION
The phenomena of urban transformation that
Bandung is experiencing are something that needs
comprehensive analysis and understanding. This is
due to the fact that these phenomena and conditions
Hafiz Amirrol, 25209022, h.amirrol@gmail
Chichi Asda Artha, 25209035, chichi_asda@yahoo.co.id
1
will be transformed into possibilities that would affect
Bandung’s built environment and its whole future
development. The topic is crucial in developing a total
understanding of the city with all of its conditions,
since these conditions of the city will also condition
the whole living environment, and also represent
human’s achievement per excellence (Rossi, 1984).
What Bandung is experiencing today is a
representation and manifestation of the collective will
of the people that inhabit it, and currently, the image
is not a good one. This paper is hoped to produce
better analysis and understanding in helping to
recognize conditions and transformations of the city
into better practices.
The advancement of computational tools in
the process of designing architecture and urbanism
has been crucial in the development of the built
environment. For the past fifteen years, parametric
and generative methods of design, often incorporating
explicit computer programming, represent a working
method based more on procedures than geometric
forms have led the practice of architectural and urban
design into a more critical ways of approaching design
issues and problems (Hanna and Turner, 2006).
Parametric design in the context of the urban
condition allows a more holistic and scientific
approach towards the understanding of the urban
fabric, morphologies, typologies, and the formation of
many other urban components based on multiple
variables of the context.
II. BANDUNG IN TRANSFORMATION
The current conception of the city has been
dominated by the deterministic approach of city
planning and its growth, which include rationalist,
planned and functionally driven approaches. These
ideas of scientific planning have ignored other
elements that are similarly important; humanistic
values, happiness, fun, spirituality and so on. It is
through this collaborative method of the paper,
qualitative and experiential natures of the city are to
be addressed in seeking approaches in making a city
more pleasurable. Subjective notions of habitation and
occupying the city can be best addressed through
speculative research in order to understand the city
from a more holistic, user-oriented perspective.
This paper will try to move away from the
modernist and rationalist legislative planning and
design methods in suggesting particular
transformation and augmentation phenomena of the
urban landscapes. It is within this concept that the
arguments will suggest that the issue of the late-
capitalist city is not simply to do with the material, the
functional and the acqusitional aspects of the city, but
contemporary urbanisms should also be concerned
with the experiential and qualitative aspects of the city
users, which include their daily life and cultural
practices as design data and guidelines (Lim, 2001).
By studying organizations and observing the
relations and behavior of patterns emerging from
users’ interactions, systematic approaches will be
introduced in developing spatial and strategic designs
that respond to, activate and enrich the complexity of
these conditions. Through these conditions that are to
be encoded through the use of generative algorithms
and speculative computational tools through changes
in design practices, it is hoped that the research will
be able to propose valid new logics that underlies
value systems that are not prescriptive and reductive,
but is driven with the performance of the city.
The practice of urbanism in the city of
Bandung, which was the product of the 19th and 20th
century urbanism were facilitated by forms of
technological development, driven by industrial
production and were designed heavily based on the
zoning and land use distribution of the city use. With
the declining quality and condition of Bandung’s city
area, it is important to re-address the whole idea of
needs in sustaining the transformation process of the
city (Suganda, 2002). While not ignoring the
programmatic aspects of the city, what the methods of
this paper try to articulate is the effect of such
transformations on inhabitation that project needs in
creating a responsive urban discourse in creating a
new conception of new forms of symbolic values, new
‘interface’ replacing the machinic capitalist city, and
the requirements of a much greater levels of self-
sufficiency and autonomy.
These ideas are seen as an alternative method
in suggesting the urban condition in addressing and
promote values and forms of social organization that
are liberating and celebratory. By shifting the
perspective in the research and design approaches, the
paper will focus on social-cultural practices rather
than the conception of the formalist and functionalist
urbanism. This will allow ‘other’ approach in
formulating complex design process of the urban
through parametricism (Schumacher, 2009). Similar
to the conventional design process, the parametric
design logic is based on two variables; (1) inputs of
data and site conditions, and (2) processing variables
2
as frameworks and logical procedures that will be
used in forming the design.
III. GENERATIVE ALGORITHM AS DESIGN
TOOL
The development of the computer as a design
tool has revolutionized the design practices of the
built environment, including architecture and urban
design. Currently, the role of the Computer Aided
Design (CAD) is an integral part in the process of
design initiation and development. Evolutionary
algorithms today are able to combine software
programming scripting with architectural design
logics to produce software with a very broad
parametric capability in assisting the process of
designing. This advancement of digital tools allow the
designer/ architect to act as the ‘master processor’
based on his own aesthetical and design logic, while
the computer functions as the intelligent assistant in
helping to solve complex design problems at many
stages, parametrically (Chevrier and Perrin, 2009).
Built within the Rhinoceros framework, the
digital tool used in this study is Grasshopper, an
associative modeling software that enables the
construction of a parametric model at a range of
different interfaces, from purely graphic through to an
entirely code based designs, thus allowing the
manipulation of such non-geometric, algorithmic
relationships as described above (Khabazi, 2010).
Algorithm is the formulation of measures to solve
problems that are commonly used in various
disciplines, including architecture and design, thus act
as a processual problem-solving tool that can form the
arrangement of spatial relationships and syntax,
circulation, ventilation, lighting, shading and so on
(Figure 1). The composition of these variables is the
algorithmic rules or constraints that are to be used in
devising the logic of design articulation and
directions.
Figure 1: The Grasshopper associative modeling algorithm
(source: Asda, 2010).
Parametric design exploration is also a real
time based tool that allows designers to obtain a
variety of alternative designs by just altering the
variables and processor inputs (Figure 2). This
flexibility in generating design studies helped as a
very effective design tool for urban studies and
analysis, especially when the design involved
complex condition such as in the context of Bandung.
In the process of urban design, many elements are
interconnected, and are mutually attractive and
exclusive. In this case, the parameter of the cultural
and daily practices can be simulated by defining these
elements with the use of architectural design standards
in forming points (vertex) and lines (vectors).
However, the main challenge here is how to define
parameters that are not measurable such as social and
cultural practices? The solution to this problem is to
establish an equation in the form of standard
architectural design frameworks so that these values
can be used as input variables for the parametric
system.
Figure 2: Parametric design alternatives produced in real-time by
altering design variables (source: Schumacher, 2009).
IV. METHODOLOGY
Since the interest of this paper is to analyze
the unstable and transforming cultural practices and
social values of Bandung, strategic research methods
are selected in forming the structure of the studies.
Multi variables conditions (spatial, programmatic,
social, culture, politics, economic, as well as the
historical particularities of the city) are the focuses of
the study, and will be used to devised ways of
developing an appropriate architectural language,
design methods and methods for drawing and
representing consequent strategic and spatial
interventions incorporating all pertinent and direct
elements, before producing the design simulation
proposal to support the arguments (Figure 3).
Figure 3: Design process cycle (source: Amirrol, 2010)
3
The design method will be operated within
designed strategic operations. The first approach is to
choose or identify and existing urban condition within
the central or peripheral areas of Bandung that can be
anything from a current development strategy to any
form of current events that directly influence the city.
1. Devise methods for immersing in the chosen
urban condition.
2. Devise ways of understanding the structure of
the urban condition.
3. Identify variables that make up and influence
the urban condition.
4. Investigate the relationship between the urban
condition and the city’s fabric.
5. Choose a moment within the urban condition
and formulate an understanding of the
relationship between physical and social-
cultural structures.
6. Develop strategies for creating interactive
relationships between physical and social-
cultural structures.
7. Devise appropriate methods of representation
and communication.
8. Define the perimeter and analyze the structure
of this urban territory.
9. Investigate the variables that make up this
urban territory.
10. Investigate different ways of transforming it
into a potential territory of action for an urban
hub.
11. Devise appropriate methods of representation
and communication.
12. Prepare preliminary proposals for a direct hub
at the architectural scale and an urban hub at
the urban scale.
At the urban scale, the research will focus on
a territory that relates to the chosen urban condition,
defining its perimeter, analyze its structure and
transform it into a potential urban hub by designing
spatial and strategic interventions.
1. Explore the potential of the designed direct
hub as an urban component and explore its
relationship to rule-based urban systems.
2. Reassess the territory of action as a potential
urban hub.
3. Identify and make use of relevant agents and
initiatives.
4. Define and design the direct role of the urban
hub by producing design simulations and
other strategic representations of the idea.
5. Define the relationship between the proposal
for the urban hub and the city's infrastructure,
fabric and rule-based systems.
6. Speculate on the interrelationship between the
three hubs: the situation, the direct hub and
the urban hub.
7. Finalize the strategy for the urban hub, model
 and represent its spatial configuration.
8. Finalize the rule-based systems required to
procure and support the urban hub and devise
appropriate methods of representation and
communication.
9. Compile the whole process as design
proposal.
V. USER METRIC FRAMEWORK
In attempting to achieve a more holistic
approach to understand the process of the practice and
transformation of urbanism in Bandung, a specific,
user-oriented analysis framework is to be established.
This user metric framework encapsulates the process
of parametric surveys.
The process of quantifying the qualities of
urban spaces and its architecture, and acknowledging
social and cultural needs is often a complicated and
intangible process (Clarke, 2008). The thesis is
proposing new techniques to measure the parameter of
the city, since current techniques (i.e. land use zoning
and distributions, plot ratio regulations, measuring
density by the numbers, etc.) in the practice of
urbanism does not adequately reflects current social-
cultural and demographic transformations of the city.
They also remain a one-dimensional and restrictive
means of ‘measuring’ the city. Therefore, alternative
measures that are more user-oriented and reflexive are
needed. The proposed alternative measures are:
V.1 Cultural Complexity
Measuring the complex cultural composition of the
areas studied based on:
1. Numbers of language or dialects used per
square meters.
2. Numbers of cultural practices differences per
square meters.
V.2 Technological Density
Assessing usage of technology by dwellers based on:
1. Numbers of wireless hotspots per square
meters.
2. Numbers of Facebook/ Twitter/ BlackBerry/
iPhone users per square meters.
3. Parameters of areas covered with Wi-Fi and
3G networks.
V. 3 Metropolitan Index
Quantifying the index of globalization’s impact on the
city and its lifestyle practices:
1. Numbers of Starbucks/ McDonalds/
Indomaret/ Circle K/ Alpha Mart in the area of
study.
2. Numbers of ideas per square meters by
mapping the distribution of creative industry
practices, design consultants, distros, creative
applications used, etc.
V.4 Demographic Growth Patterns
Measuring demographic data to gain insights on
varying socio-economic conditions by measuring:
1. Fertility rates or number of births per square
meters.
2. Health impacts and mapping of diseases on
dwellers per square meters.
VI. CONCLUSION
Culture is a basic element for any design
process, in which culture affects human behavior
within the community. However, not every cultural
and social value can be used as measured variables,
thus demanding the architect/ designer to still have
their own sensitivity in articulating cultural values
into the design parameters. Much generative design
today is produced simply as an exploration of the
method and are geometrical based. Not many
designers utilize digital tools by including cultural
values as their design variables. Generative algorithms
associated with cultural variables are relatively new
and requires new techniques of thinking and
modeling. More liberated approaches in articulating
variables into design strategies are needed. It is hoped
that by conducting these alternative methods in
quantifying data on the areas to be studied, emerging
issues of change, needs and use may anticipate how
design practices can make more purposeful
intervention, while creating opportunities for
alternative approaches and innovations.
REFERENCES
Chevrier, C & Perrin, J.P. (2008) Generation of Architectural
Parametric Components – Cultural Heritage 3D
Modelling. Montreal: CAAD Futures 2009.
Clarke, P. (2008) Metricity: Exploring New Measures of Urban
Density. London: Royal College of Art.
Hanna, S. & Turner, A. (2006) Teaching Parametric Design in
Code and Construction. London: Bartlett School of
Graduate Studies, UCL.
Khabazi, Z. (2010). Generative Algorithms using Grasshopper.
Retrieved Agustus 1, 2010, from
www.morphogenisism.com.
Lim, W. (2001) Alternatives in Transition – The Postmodern,
Glocality and Social Justice. Singapore: Select
Publishing.
Rossi, A. (1984) Architecture of the City. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Schumacher, P. (2009). Parametricism - A New Global Style for
Architecture and Urban Design. Retrieved October
2010, from www.patrikschumacher.com
Suganda, H. (2002) Jendela Bandung – Pengalaman Bersama
KOMPAS. Jakarta: Penerbit Buku Kompas.