Study of visibility in creating socially interactive spaces in contemporary high-rise apartment building complex in Dhaka.

Abstract

Changes in housing context, social structure and advancing technology, over the time, have brought a dramatic change in the social context of Dhaka. The close-knit conservative society of the pre-colonial period changed its character to a more formal one during the colonial period, where social status ruled. The lack of options for physical expansion and shortage of developed urban land made contemporary apartments a prevalent choice among the affluent section of the urban population. These affluent but socially varied communities belonging from wide ranging socio-cultural backgrounds faced social awkwardness in absence of social interaction. They are less likely to socially interact among themselves, compared to their counterparts living in the traditional and spontaneously grown neighbourhood. The urban society in Dhaka City has gone through a rapid transitory phase, where the people of early mohoIlabased societies were more interdependent on each other. This form of interdependency often acted as a social control to maintain the social Integrity. The traditional urban settlements had semi-public and private area in the form of a courtyard; a place for social interactions. These courtyards have been replaced by common corridors in contemporary apartments, which serve as a space for occasional interaction among inhabitants. Besides the shared spaces, high-rise apartments in Dhaka also have a minimum of 10% of the total floor area dedicated as community space as per the Building Construction Rule 1996. However, many apartments are exempted from this rule. Many architects, being aware of this problem of non-existence or inadequate shared spaces, have come up with different design solutions in the form of courtyards, swimming pools, multipurpose halls etc., to generate social interaction within the apartment building. There is a lack of evaluation of how the social spaces perform from the user’s perspective, initiating social interaction among the residents. Visibility of these social spaces, which is the ability of residents to observe the shared space in one's environment, is an important factor affecting social interaction. Thus, the study aims to establish a relationship between space and visibility that can positively correlate in upgrading social interactions. Three housing complexes, each having at least 150 families as occupants were assessed to find the qualitative aspects of social interaction in the shared spaces. Visibility Graph Analysis (VGA) with depth map program along with the occupant’s interview and observation-based survey was conducted to estimate values of locations that have the maximum visual integration in a spatial configuration. Study leads to findings that the apartments those have courtyard or open spaces encourages better social interaction due to better visual integration. Moreover, influence of other factors such as having circulation areas within the apartments are also found to enhance social interaction if visually connected. The outcome of the study can also be considered as a documentation of guidelines established in the process may help future studies in this field.