Interface Space

Being among the major elements of urban configuration, streets and roads constitute the linear space of city life, function as passageways linking adjacent regions and load the communications, socializing and entertainment of citizens. They are enclosed by various interfaces, an important type of constitute factors of city scenery which function as the mediator of urban space and the margins and boundaries of different places. The nature, composition and functions of interfaces can play a significant role in forming city roads and streets, figuring spatial atmospheres and determining the spatial quality of citizens'go-out. Lying on the border of indoor and outdoor spaces, interfaces can integrate the respective functions of these spaces while performing them simultaneously, coordinate the interaction between buildings and their surrounding environment, and particularize the significance and atmosphere of such environment.Proceeding from the exposition on interfaces, and with the characteristics of human behavior taken into consideration, this paper investigates such problems to the road& street lack of coordination between buildings and their surrounding environment, irrational scale of construction and the oblivion of street life. It first concentrates on the concept "interface", by discoursing the nature and configuration of interfacial spaces and elaborating on the functions of such spaces as well as their restrictions and creative effects on street spaces. Then from the perspective of architecture, the paper expounds various problems facing city roads and streets, and crystallizes buildings'leading role in the configuration of street interfaces by analyzing the effects of the physical components of architectural interfaces on the scales, images, patterns and atmospheres of those roads and streets. Finally, focusing on the psychological and physiological needs of human, the paper exposits and generalizes the behavioral relations between interfaces and urban residents, and dwells on the reciprocal demands and inter-constraints of these citizens and the street environment. To sum up, this paper centers on the street-based relations between interfaces, buildings, environment and human.In this paper, with comprehensive, systematic theoretical analyses, relevant theories are applied to several cases of city-road& street design, and thereby examined and improved. Besides, some improvements on design concepts and methods are made, with several approaches and channels of street-based interfacial integration proposed. All the work is aimed to conceptualize a type of sustainable, renewable and comfortable city street environment that combines physical and humanity features, and is principled on humanization and ecologicality.