In-Between Spaces in the Expanding City: Their Role in Designing New Urban Centralities

Planetary urbanisation expands incessantly and urban space occupies an ever larger share of the earth’s surface. There is a pressing need to elaborate innovative interpretive models to better understand the ongoing radical transformations of the city. One of the consequences of these dramatic changes has been the emergence of a plurality of what have been called ‘in-between’ spaces. In-between spaces are the residual sub-products of current urbanisation processes, and assume as many different forms as the processes behind their formation, but they are also important reservoirs of social, ecological and imaginative diversity. Our research suggests that the way these two aspects mutually reinforce each other can be used as the basis for a much-needed innovative approach to planning socially and environmentally sustainable cities. This paper proposes an approach to analysing and categorising in-between spaces and observes their rhythms, borders and evolution. In the light of this analytical framework, we suggest some specific planning and design strategies for grasping the inherent social potential of these in-between spaces and for creating a network of public spaces which will provide new centralities for in-between cities.