Sir Patrick Geddes - remembering the Aberdeenshire thinker who pioneered town planning

Jamie Saunderson

2 October 2024 at 7:24 am·1-min read

Sir Patrick Geddes pioneered modern urban planning ideas — -Credit: (Image: National Galleries)

Sir Patrick Geddes was a jack of many trades and a master of several.

A renowned biologist, sociologist and geographer, he pioneered modern urban planning and coined the now-ubiquitous term 'conurbation'.

He was born the son of Janet Stevenson and soldier Alexander Geddes on October 2, 1854 in Ballater and educated between Aberdeenshire and Perth Academy.

As a young man, he went to study in London and met the likes of Charles Darwin as he took his early career steps and joined the London Positivist Society, becoming an advocate of the ideas of French philosopher Comte. He later worked at the Universities of Edinburgh and Dundee.

He is famed for having introduced the concept of 'region' to architectural theory and for his championing of 'primary human needs' in urban planning.

His concept of the 'conurbation' - a group of settlements that merges to form a continuous urban area through expansion - has become one of the most commonly used terms in the planning sphere.

The American urban theorist Lewis Mumford was one of Geddes's biggest admirers, hailing him as a 'global thinker in practice, a whole generation or more before the Western democracies fought a global war'.

Geddes died on April 17, 1932, but the University of Dundee's Geddes Institute for Urban Research continues his legacy by developing theoretical approaches based on his ideas.

He had dedicated the last few years of his life to founding and developing the Collège des Écossais, or Scots College, in Montpellier, France. The site is preserved today as a historic monument.

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