The starting point for this paper is to discuss and challenge the visual dominance in architectural thinking, and to raise competence among architects and planners on sound and sound environment issues. To promote a sustainable urban environment,sounds must be integrated in the complexity of urban design and development. Therefore,it is especially important to integrate acoustic and architectural analysis.

The paper focuses on urban public space as well as indoor public pathways, communication space and semi-public commercial space, e.g. shopping malls, wherereliability on sonic orientation may be crucial. For these kinds of collective spaces, I argue, it is especially important to integrate acoustic and architectural analysis. Their sonic conditions are often loud, blurred, and confusing, with little correspondence between visual and aural perception, and with weak articulations of spatial dimension, distance, borders, and orientation. If not cared for, the result may be increasing sound disturbance, lack of people’s moving through the areas, dangerous differences between day and night use, disorientation for several user groups, and segregation.

The paper is integrated in the ongoing research project, Transmission, executed by Urban Sound Institute (USIT), financed by Swedish Research Council. Results will hopefully deliver good examples and operative methods to be used by architects, planners and acousticians. The paper is also a result of ongoing projects and research at the acoustic consultancy company Ingemansson Technology AB, Sweden