URBANSCAPE CONFIGURATION AS DETERMINED BY THE SURFACE COMPLEXITY OF STATION BUILDING IN CENTRAL TOKYO

This paper attempts to clarify elevational aspects of urban space in the center of Tokyo from the point of view of continuity in configuration and articulation of station buildings' surfaces. Initially, the continuity of station buidings' surfaces is analyzed in terms of two aspects of comparative scale with neighbor buildings. One is comparative scale in terms of actual height and width of the buildings themselves. The other is the comparative articulated width of the station buildings' surfaces. Secondly, the fundamental mode and conditions of surface continuity of station building in urban space were determined by collating these two aspects. Thirdly, the characteristics of the surface complexity of station building are categorized in terms of models. One paradigm and three fundamental models were isolated by deploying the above-mentioned data, which may be said to represent one aspect of the urban form of contemporary Tokyo, and which afford one possibly useful way of describing the urban spatial character Tokyo today.