It is no longer unusual to find automated systems as partners in the architectural design process. Most, if not all, of these systems are limited to solving well-structured problems efficiently and accurately. The use of these systems relies on manual decomposition of complex problems into more...

This note replies briefly to a recent criticism of the SIRO-PLAN/LUPLAN approach to land-use planning which claims it to be politically regressive, closed to public participation, and inadequately representative of the sort of planning problems it is intended to assist with.

In examining the adaptability of various urban forms to events such as sudden oil shortages, or uncertainties in supply, it is important to distinguish between short-term adjustments and more durable medium-term and longer-term effects. Whereas short-term effects may just involve certain...

Although regional economic impact studies stop a long way short of providing economic evaluations of alternative uses of open space, they are valuable in quantifying tangible contributions of recreation and tourism to local economic activity. Such studies might be vital in supporting the case...

Research into a generalized logic modelling system linked to machine interpretation of drawings and text is described. This work is related to a view of design and builds on experience of working integrated design systems. Questions are posed for future computer-aided design systems.

The entropy-maximising methodology for variables which take discrete values is used to derive the rank-size rule and to give a new interpretation of the constants. Relationships are found between the real populations of the cities, the populations that are given by the models, and the rank of...

A previous issue of this journal included a paper called "SIRO-PLAN and LUPLAN: an Australian approach to land-use planning". The approach is described here in more conventional plan-making and plan-evaluation terms and is observed to be inappropriate for the types of problems it is intended to...

Computing is coming to play an increasing role in the design process. However, the role of computer-aided design cannot be understood without taking into account the major quantitative and qualitative changes that occur regularly as generations of computers develop. Computing technology may be...