Below is a kind of check list of dimensions which are useful for urban design and planning projects.

These numbers & areas could be used to layout a sustainable township from scratch, but they're also useful for me for this project because it gives me a set of principles to work with. For example - if I want to propose that Charlotte Street be transformed into a linear park I need to be able to justify open space amenity in that location in relation to the rest of the city.

I will also use these principles to work out where the boundaries of 'my neighbourhood' should be.

Some of the figures below come from principles of New Urbanism, some from Superbia, some from Christopher Alexander.

From a Pattern Language - Alexander:

Metropolis
Ideal downtown area which can provide "magic of the city" without over-population and urban sprawl issues.

• Max 1.6km wide (but can be long)
• 300 000 people within 5-23km of each other
• Shopping streets – one for every 10 000 people; 2.9km apart
• Markets of many shops - one for every 4000 people; 1.8km
• Corner groceries one for every 1 000 people; 0.8km apart

• 1.6 to 3.2 km across
• Surrounded by a ring road
• Slow moving local traffic and bikes within ring road
  
• One way parallel streets for connecting traffic (very few cross streets)

• 400m to 3.2km across
• About 30 HA
• Maximum 10 0000 people
• Densities of 125 people per HA will support a promenade within 5-10 minute walk (460m) (Collingwood density is 50 people per HA)

• 50-400m across

• 90 - 275m across with about 400-500 residents

• 8-12 households (about 30-50 people)
• can be as few as 3 households

• 10-20 work places

• People should commute a maximum 20-30 minutes

• 500-1500 amount of people who can ‘rally together’

• 5 minute walk (400m radius) based on new urbanist ‘walkability’ principle
  

• 25-40 houses – optimal number of houses where occupants can get to know each other well and share facilities

• 14m – the distance where you can recognise an individual