Urban village

Seeing the market on a Saturday I had the most positive feeling about the site and felt there was a genuinely good atmosphere. The site was a destination. There was activity there. Looking at its history the Milk Market has been a place of trade for almost 200 years. I felt somewhere in this was the key to the spirit of the place, something I feel it's important to maintain. I feel it also needs a sense of place, and a sense of being one thing, and the people there should have a sense of being part of a collective. Reading Alice Taylor's The Parish, I felt her villages sense of commuity and pride was what I needed. I was looking for a sense of togetherness and the provision of services, trades, for the community in the community. What I wanted was a village within the city. Being aware that my vision of a village may be a little nostalgic, I wanted to find its equivilent in todays world. I found the concept of an urban village, it seems to be along the lines of what I'm looking for...

WHAT IS AN URBAN VILLAGE?
An urban village is a concept of a settlement which is small enough to
create a community in the truest sense of the word - a group of people
who support each other, but big enough to maintain a reasonable cross
section of facilities. Walking determines the size - a 10 minute walk
from one side to the other. To provide a sufficiently large population to
maintain a range of community facilities all within a walkable distance
means the density of development must be high. An urban village is
densely developed in the centre, with town squares and key community
focal points, density eases away from the centre, and the boundary of
the village is marked by greenspace.