EKISTICS — the science of human settlements — is at the beginning of its evolution. It is trying to provide an answer to the important problems involved in maintaining and operating human settlements today. Elastics avoids the term "city", "metropolis", or "village". The phrase "human settlements" shelters under one roof all species belonging to this family, the family of the habitat created by man for himself. In the past, human settlements comprised only villages, then villages and cities, and later metropolises. Now we speak of megalopolises. To define our field as the field of all human settlements is to be free to conceive their proper dimensions and their proper character. Ekistics looks at the problem of human settlements with no prejudice as to their kind, size or form.

From Traffic Quarterly, v.17, no.3, July 1963, p. 439-457: plans.