VIRTUAL Lisbon Livable Cities

Abstract

What makes a city livable has often been assessed through various livability indices, which predominantly focus on quantitative elements such as transportation, infrastructure, education, and healthcare. Yet, the dominance of these measurable parameters tends to overshadow the invisible yet crucial web of everyday relationships that shape urban experience. Rather than approaching livability through these measurable elements, this paper emphasizes qualitative aspects, particularly how things relate to one another, through the concept of the in-between realm. Rooted in philosopher Martin Buber’s thinking, Aldo van Eyck developed this concept as a common ground where conflicting opposites can meet, interact, and reconcile. Unlike the recent usage of the in-between realm or in-between space, which mostly connotes the space between the public and private, van Eyck defined the in-between realm as the place for various relationships including but not limited to inside/outside, individual/collective, house/city, small/large, public/private, and even order/chaos. Drawing from my PhD research, this paper critically examines selected projects by van Eyck and Herman Hertzberger to reveal the multifaceted meanings and implications of the in-between realm. It also considers a range of contemporary approaches that offer various forms of relatedness and connections between opposing elements. In doing so, the paper seeks to reveal the in-between realm’s latent potential to weave an invisible network of relationships, which are often overlooked in conventional assessments of urban livability.