In alphabetical order

T

Tacit knowledge
‘Unwritten, unspoken, and hidden vast storehouse of knowledge held by practically every normal human being, based on his or her emotions, experiences, insights, intuition, observations and internalized information. Tacit knowledge is integral to the entirety of a person's consciousness, is acquired largely through association with other people, and requires joint or shared activities to be imparted from on to another. Like the submerged part of an iceberg it constitutes the bulk of what one knows, and forms the underlying framework that makes explicit knowledge possible. Concept of tacit knowledge was introduced by the Hungarian philosopher-chemist Michael Polanyi (1891-1976) in his 1966 book 'The Tacit Dimension.' Also called informal knowledge’ (“Tacit Knowledge”, 2020, para.1).

T

Tactical urbanism
‘Tactical Urbanism is all about action. Also known as DIY Urbanism, Planning-by-Doing, Urban Acupuncture, or Urban Prototyping, this approach refers to a city, organizational, and/or citizen-led approach to neighborhood building using short-term, low-cost, and scalable interventions to catalyze long-term change’ (Tactical Urbanist’s Guide, 2019).

T

Teleology
‘Teleology, (from Greek telos, “end,” and logos, “reason”), explanation by reference to some purpose, end, goal, or function’ (“Teleology”, 2016, para.1).

T

Tenants Purchase Scheme

‘The Tenants Purchase Scheme (TPS) was introduced by the Housing Authority's (HA) in 1998. In 2002, the Government reviewed its overall housing policy. In support of the Government's repositioned housing policy, the HA terminated the TPS after the sale of TPS Phase 6B in 2005 / 2006. According to prevailing policy, tenants in the existing TPS estates can still opt to purchase their flats.’ (Hong Kong Housing Authority, 2019) 

T

Tertiary Planning Unit (TPU)

The Tertiary Planning Unit (TPU) is a geographic reference system demarcated by the Planning Department for the territory of Hong Kong. Each TPU is subdivided into a number of Street Blocks (SB) for urban areas and Village Clusters (VC) for rural areas (Hong Kong Government, 2004).

T

The Place Diagram

‘In evaluating thousands of public spaces around the world, PPS has found that to be successful, they generally share the following four qualities: they are accessible; people are engaged in activities there; the space is comfortable and has a good image; and finally, it is a sociable place: one where people meet each other and take people when they come to visit. PPS developed The Place Diagram below as a tool to help people in judging any place, good or bad’ (Project for Public Spaces, n.d.).

T

The Tragedy of Commons

1. ‘The tragedy of the commons is an economic problem in which every individual has an incentive to consume a resource at the expense of every other individual with no way to exclude anyone from consuming. It results in overconsumption, under investment, and ultimately depletion of the resource. As the demand for the resource overwhelms the supply, every individual who consumes an additional unit directly harms others who can no longer enjoy the benefits. Generally, the resource of interest is easily available to all individuals; the tragedy of the commons occurs when individuals neglect the well-being of society in the pursuit of personal gain.’ (Chappelow, 2019) 

 

2. In Town Planning: 

  • ‘In the tragedy of the community, the members of the community fail to protect the boundary between individual and collective rationality 
  • In the tragedy of the government, the land management authority establishes an unlimited bureaucracy and disrespects the boundary drawn by individual liberty and community values  
  • In the tragedy of the individualist, the private landowners use their land as they deem fit...the free land uses breach the legitimate interests of other members of society.’ (Davy, 2012, p.13) 

T

There is no alternative (TINA)
‘"There is no alternative," often abbreviated as "TINA," is a phrase that originated with the Victorian philosopher Herbert Spencer and became a slogan of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Today, it is often used by investors to explain a less-than-ideal portfolio allocation, usually of stocks, because other asset classes offer even worse returns. This situation, and the subsequent decisions of investors, can lead to the "Tina Effect" whereby stocks rise only because investors have no viable alternative’ (Investopedia, 2019c).

T

Tiebout model

Households will sort themselves into municipalities according to their ideal level (demand) for local public good. Assumptions include: perfect information and mobility, no externalities, no economies of scale, head taxes finance and local public good. (O’Sullivan, 2012)

T

Too big to fail

‘"Too big to fail" describes a concept in which the government will intervene in situations where a business has become so deeply ingrained in the functionality of an economy that its failure would be disastrous to the economy at large. If such a company fails, it would likely have a catastrophic ripple effect throughout the economy. The failure may cause problems with companies which rely on the failing company's business as a customer as well as problems with unemployment as workers lose their jobs. Conceptually, in these situations, the government will consider the costs of a bailout in comparison to the costs of allowing economic failure in a decision to allocate funds for help.’ (Young, 2019) 

T

Topology

‘Topology studies properties of spaces that are invariant under any continuous deformation. It is sometimes called “rubber-sheet geometry” because the objects can be stretched and contracted like rubber, but cannot be broken’ (University of Waterloo, n.d.).

T

Total factor productivity

‘Total Factor Productivity (TFP) is the portion of output not explained by the amount of inputs used in production. As such, its level is determined by how efficiently and intensely the inputs are utilized in production.’ (Comin, 2006, p.1)

T

Town Planning Ordinance

The Town Planning Ordinance is a procedural legal document and legislation ‘to promote the health, safety, convenience and general welfare of the community by making provision for the systematic preparation and approval of plans for the lay-out of areas of Hong Kong as well as for the types of building suitable for erection therein and for the preparation and approval of plans for areas within which permission is required for development’ (Department of Justice, 2017).

T

Traffic calming

‘Developed in Europe, traffic calming (a direct translation of the German "vekehrsberuhigung") is a system of design and management strategies that aim to balance traffic on streets with other uses. It is founded on the idea that streets should help create and preserve a sense of place, that their purpose is for people to walk, stroll, look, gaze, meet, play, shop and even work alongside cars - but not dominated by them. The tools of traffic calming take a different approach from treating the street only as a conduit for vehicles passing through at the greatest possible speed. They include techniques designed to lessen the impact of motor vehicle traffic by slowing it down, or literally "calming" it. This helps build human-scale places and an environment friendly to people on foot.’ (Project for Public Spaces, 2008)

T

Traffic impact assessment

‘Traffic impact assessments (TIAs) are crucial to understanding how a proposed development will impact the surrounding transport network’ (Cooley et al., 2016, p.1).

T

Transactive planning
Transactive planning focuses on mutual learning through dialogic processes or communicative rationality. It is a model developed by John Friedmann when he was advisor to the Chilean government in the early 1970s (Friedmann, 1973).

T

Transit Adjacent Development

‘In recent years, transit-adjacent development (TAD) emerged as a spectrum of transit-oriented development (TOD). TAD is described as the land adjacent to the transit stop, however, it fails to capitalize on encouraging compact mixed-use development, lacking land-use composition, in particular station access or site design.’ (SCHOBYJ, 2012)

T

Transit-oriented Development

‘TOD, or transit-oriented development, means integrated urban places designed to bring people, activities, buildings, and public space together, with easy walking and cycling connection between them and near-excellent transit service to the rest of the city. It means inclusive access for all to local and citywide opportunities and resources by the most efficient and healthful combination of mobility modes, at the lowest financial and environmental cost, and with the highest resilience to disruptive events. Inclusive TOD is a necessary foundation for long-term sustainability, equity, shared prosperity, and civil peace in cities.’ (Institute for Transportation & Development Policy, 2019b)

T

Transport mode

‘It refers to the different ways in which people, goods and information can be moved from one place to another. It includes land, water and air transportation. The various kind of transportation modes are rail, road, ship and aviation. But other transportation media also exist i.e. pipelines, optical fiber, cable etc. Each transportation mode has its own characteristics, benefits, technical requirements and risks involved. The choice of transportation system depends upon need of customer. Often inter-modal transportation is used in order to reach to the customer.’ (MBASkool, 2019b)

T

Trip distribution

‘Trip generation estimates the number and types of trips originating and terminating in zones. Trip distribution is the process of computing the number of trips between one zone and all other. A trip matrix is drawn up with the sums of rows indicating the total number of trips originating in zone i and the sums of columns the total number of destinations attracted to zone’ (Planning Tank, 2019).

T

Trip generation

‘A trip is usually defined in transport modeling as a single journey made by an individual between two points by a specified mode of travel and for a defined purpose. Trips are often considered as productions of a particular land-use and attracted to other specified land-uses. The number of trips arises in unit time, usually for a specified zonal land use, is called the trip generation rate’ (Planning Tank, 2019).

T

Truth politics
McGuirk (2001, p.207) argues that ‘power takes effect through the ability to define what is accepted as knowledge, and is accorded the authoritative status of truth. The production of knowledge is therefore an effect of the exercise of power’.

T

Urban furniture

‘Urban furniture refers to pieces of furniture found in public spaces or in the urban environment, for example, park benches’ (Tosca, 2018).

Reference List

Chappelow, J. (2019). Tragedy Of The Commons. In Investopedia. Retrieved from https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/tragedy-of-the-commons.asp

Comin, D. (2006). Total Factor Productivity. Retrieved from http://www.people.hbs.edu/dcomin/def.pdf

Cooley, K., Gruyter, C.D. & Delbosc, A. (2016). A Best Practice Evaluation of Traffic Impact Assessment Guidelines in Australia and New Zealand. Australasian Transport Research Forum, pp.1-21.

Department of Justice (2017). Town Planning Ordinance. Retrieved from https://www.elegislation.gov.hk/hk/cap131?xpid=ID_1438402658985_001.

Friedmann, J. (1973). Retracking America: A Theory of Transactive Planning. Garden City: Doubleday and Anchor Books.

Harris, J., & White, V. (2018). Tacit Knowledge. In A Dictionary of Social Work and Social Care. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Retrieved from https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198796688.001.0001/acref-9780198796688-e-1480.

Hong Kong Government (2004). Implementation of Data Alignment Measures for the Alignment of Planning, Lands and Public Works Data: Final Report (Volume 2E) Specification and Explanatory Notes of TPU/SB CSU. Retrieved from https://www.devb.gov.hk/filemanager/en/content_384/frv2E.pdf.

Hong Kong Housing Authority. (2019). Buying a Flat under TPS. Retrieved from https://www.housingauthority.gov.hk/en/home-ownership/buying-a-flat-under-tps/index.html

Institute for Transportation & Development Policy. (2019b). What is TOD? Retrieved from https://www.itdp.org/library/standards-and-guides/tod3-0/what-is-tod/

Investopedia. (2019c). TINA: There Is No Alternative. Retrieved from https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/tina-there-no-alternative.asp

McGuirk, P.M. (2001). Situating communicative planning theory: context, power and knowledge. Environment and Planning A, 33, pp.195-217.

O’Sullivan, A. (2012). Urban economics (8th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Planning Tank (2019). Trip Generation. Retrieved from https://planningtank.com/transportation/trip-generation.

Project for Public Spaces. (2008). Traffic Calming 101. Retrieved from https://www.pps.org/article/livememtraffic

Project for Public Spaces. (n.d.). What makes a successful place? Retrieved from https://www.pps.org/article/grplacefeat

SCHOBYJ. (2012, December 2). Transit Adjacent Development [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://tsugrowthmanagement.wordpress.com/2012/12/02/transit-adjacent-development/

Tacit Knowledge. (2020). In Business Dictionary. Retrieved from http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/tacit-knowledge.html.

Tactical Urbanist’s Guide. (2019). What is Tactical Urbanism? Retrieved from http://tacticalurbanismguide.com/about/.

Teleology. (2016). In Encyclopaedia Britannica. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/teleology.

Tosca, K. (2018). What is urban furniture? Retrieved from https://www.neko-europe.com/what-is-urban-furniture/

University of Waterloo. (n.d.). What is Topology? Retrieved from https://uwaterloo.ca/pure-mathematics/about-pure-math/what-is-pure-math/what-is-topology

Young, J. (2019). Too Big To Fail. In Investopedia. Retrieved from https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/too-big-to-fail.asp