New Article: Omer & Zafrir-Reuven, The Development of Street Patterns in Israeli Cities

Omer, Itzhak, and Orna Zafrir-Reuven. “The Development of Street Patterns in Israeli Cities.” Journal of Urban and Regional Analysis 7.2 (2015): 113-27.

ְְ 

URL: http://www.jurareview.ro/2015_7_2/a1_72.pdf [PDF]

 

Abstract

Street patterns of Israeli cities were investigated by comparing three time periods of urban development: (I) the late 19th century until the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948; (II) 1948 until the 1980s; and (III) the late 1980s until the present. These time periods are related respectively to the pre-modern, modern and late-modern urban planning approach. Representative urban street networks were examined in selected cities by means of morphological analysis of typical street pattern properties: curvature, fragmentation, connectivity, continuity and differentiation. The study results reveal significant differences between the street patterns of the three examined periods in the development of cities in Israel. The results show clearly the gradual trends in the intensification of curvature, fragmentation, complexity and hierarchical organization of street networks as well as the weakening of the network’s internal and external connectivity. The implications of these changes on connectivity and spatial integration are discussed with respect to planning approaches.

 

 

 

New Article: Omer & Goldblatt, Spatial Patterns of Retail Activity in Israeli Cities

Omer, Itzhak, and Ran Goldblatt. “Spatial Patterns of Retail Activity and Street Network Structure in New and Traditional Israeli Cities.” Urban Geography (early view; online first).

 
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02723638.2015.1101258
 
Abstract

The association between spatial patterns of retail activity and the spatial configuration of street networks was examined by means of the space syntax methodology in eight Israeli cities that represent two city types, characterized by different planning approaches and urban growth: (i) new towns, which were established according to a comprehensive city plan and modern planning concepts of “tree-like” hierarchical street networks and “neighborhood units”; (ii) older cities, where street networks and the spatial patterns of retail activity were formed incrementally during their growth. Unlike in older cities, retail activity in new towns concentrates in relatively less-accessible and intermediate locations. This is indicated by a weak correlation between retail activity and the street network’s Integration and Choice centrality measures. The comparison between Israeli cities illustrates the influence of urban growth and planning approaches on the formation of retail activity and its interaction with the structure of the street network.

 

 

 

New Article: Waterman, Ideology and Events in Israeli Human Landscape Revisited

Waterman, Stanley. “Ideology and Events in Israeli Human Landscape Revisited.” Jewish Journal of Sociology 57.1-2 (2015).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.5750/jjsoc.v57i1/2.107

 

Abstract

This paper casts a retrospective gaze at an article written as a beginning academic who had immigrated to Israel just two years prior, some 40 years ago. Not wanting to alter anything I had written, it was subsequently published nearly five years later. In that paper, I observed a deep abyss between the Israel I “understood”—mainly through reading—before I immigrated and which I thought I “knew”, and the Israel I was experiencing following my arrival. This chasm led me to identify Israeli myths contra an Israeli reality and caused me to pose what were for me, at the time of writing, some disturbing questions about Israeli landscape and society. I did this by choosing three iconic landscapes — new towns, kibbutzim and the desert — and picking away at misunderstandings about them and the way in which we perceived Israel. Four decades on, I ask whether I had been impulsive in writing that paper then with so little experience and if a similar paper in a similar vein were to be written, set in 2015 rather than 1974, what questions might be asked about Israel now and what would they say about Israeli society and culture?

 

 

Report: A Picture of the Nation, 2015; Taub Center for Social Policy

The Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel Presents:

A Picture of the Nation: Israel’s Society and Economy in Figures, one of the Center’s most popular publications, provides concise and thought-provoking information on Israel’s long-run economic and social trajectories.  Each page of this booklet contains a single graph and short, accompanying text that, when combined, provide the reader with a broad and comprehensive understanding of key socioeconomic issues in Israel today.  Policy makers, the media, the general public, and the global Jewish community look to the Picture of the Nation as an invaluable and highly accessible resource on topics ranging from the labor market to education, poverty and much more.

For the English page, including PDF and PPT versions of the report, as well as previous reports (2002-2014), click here.

For the Hebrew page, click here.

PDF version in English: Picture of the Nation, 2015.

PDF version in Hebrew: תמונת מצב המדינה, 2015.

New Book: Wilhelm and Gust, eds. New Towns for a New State (German)

Wilhelm, Karin and Kerstin Gust, eds. Neue Städte für einen neuen Staat. Die städtebauliche Erfindung des modernen Israel und der Wiederaufbau in der BRD. Eine Annäherung. Bielefeld: transcript, 2013.

URL: http://www.transcript-verlag.de/978-3-8376-2204-1/neue-staedte-fuer-einen-neuen-staat

Abstract

Israel and Palestine – What is today presented as a seemingly hopeless political situation, began with optimism, albeit a naive dream, towards building a peaceful society for all religions with the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. For this purpose, the economist Edgar Salin (1892-1974) founded in 1958 “The Israel Economic and Sociological Research Project (IESRP),” which was to play a central role in the establishment of the “new towns” in Israel. The contributions here examine for the first time in a systematic way this project and its cultural and political importance, as well as relevant topics including planning debates and construction issues in the Federal Republic of Germany.

With contributions by Eliezer Ben-Rafael, Meron Benvenisti, Jörn Düwel, Zvi Efrat, Anton Föllmi, Rachel callus, Ruth Kark, Anna Minta, Andreas Nachama, Willi Oberkrome, Martin Peschken, Bertram Schefold, Axel Schildt, Julius H. Schoeps, Korinna Schönhärl, Yaakov Sharett, Thomas Sieverts, Joachim Trezib, Stefan Vogt, Georg Wagner Kyora, Karin Wilhelm, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn and Moshe Zuckermann.

Click here for a Table of Contents (in German)

New Article: Tadmor-Shimony, Women Immigrant Teachers in 1950s Israel

Tadmor-Shimony, Tali. “Women Immigrant Teachers and State Formation in Israel, 1948–1959.” Journal of Women’s History 26.3 (2014): 81-104.

URL:http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/journal_of_womens_history/v026/26.3.tadmor-shimony.html

Abstract

This article discusses the phenomenon of women immigrant teachers during the 1950s in Israel, an issue which incorporates several research topics: migration, gender, and teaching. It asks whether the popular saying: “Teaching is women’s work,” was true in regard to Israel during this time period. In order to do so, this article examines the choices and actions of those women, all of whom were trying to cope with their new situation and to integrate successfully into the host society. A large portion of women immigrant teachers found jobs in immigrant villages and development towns. From an educational point of view, these women were not the strongest link in the pedagogical chain, and yet they were asked to assist in the formation of a new society. By doing so, they chose to become agents of acculturation and carried out leadership functions; they became empowered, and quickly shed their weak, immigrant women status.

–