I'm in Melbourne, Australia, the country's second largest city by population and the capital of the state of Victoria.

Melbourne's central high density zone is concentrated around a grid plan, colloquially known as the Hoddle Grid.

Today we're going to find out a little bit more about its origins and how it shaped the city.

Grid plan cities are where streets run orthogonally, at right angles to eachother, of which provide regular intersection, facilitate pedestrian movement and assist with orientation.

Examples of grid plan cities can be found across much of the world, with ancient grids evident in the planning of early Roman and Grecian settlements, throughout Mesopotamia in modern day Iraq and also in traditional Chinese urban planning.

Cities including New York, Barcelona, Buenos Aires and Johannesburg all show examples of the fundamentalism of grids in their respective planning. These ideals were also instituted in many of the cities here in Australia.

Melbourne was founded in 1835 by British free settlers from nearby Tasmania, two independent parties pioneered by John Batman and John Pascoe Fawkner arrived only months apart and settled here along the banks of the Yarra River, where a natural turning basin had formed adjacent to small falls and the freshwater river beyond.

The original settlement site was later occupied by the Customs House to oversee immigration to the city of which today is home to the Immigration Museum.

The settlement was established on lands traditionally owned and occupied by Aboriginal inhabitants.

A land purchase was negotiated between the parties, however was later annulled by the presiding New South Wales Governor Sir Richard Bourke, citing all lands to the colony of New South Wales and to the control of the British Crown and deeming the settlement illegitimate.

The New South Wales Governor soon looked to engage surveyor Robert Russell to lay out the new township and allow for authorised land sales to occur, and after Russell was called back to Sydney to continue his commitments there the task was given in 1837 to surveyor Robert Hoddle to complete the plan.

It was during this time also that Governor Bourke established the city name of 'Melbourne' in honour of the then current British Prime Minister.

Hoddle laid his plan over the original establishment survey prepared by Russell. With a grid to run generally parallel to the river and its full extent bound by the three significant hills in the vicinity.

Batman's Hill to the west, where settler John Batman took residence; Flagstaff Hill to the north, with its name derived from its use as a flag outpost, and; Eastern Hill, where today we find the Parliament House of Victoria.

The colony of New South Wales had in 1829 already established planning regulations to guide the setout out of new gridded cities, with a requirement for square blocks and wide streets.

Hoddle used this guidance to arrange blocks using a unit measurement of chains. 1 chain is equal to 22 yards or just over 20 metres.

The unit of chains is no longer commonplace, however is still used with 1 chain equal to the standard length of a cricket pitch between stumps.

Grids were sized to 10 by 10 chains or approximately 200 by 200 metres, with street widths of 1 and a 1/2 chains, or 30 metres.

Blocks were then equally subdivided into 20 parcels measuring 1 chain or 20 metres across the street frontage for central plots and doubled for the shallower corner plots. This allowed for all subdivisions to be equal in area.

Further to the regulation four square blocks, the New South Wales Governor also requested that the plan allow for rear laneway access with smaller streets of a half chain or 10 metres later included and the area redistributed from the adjacent plots.

The primary streets today provide two-way road access and an additional on street parking or tram and bus corridor, where the little streets are typically limited to provide road access in one direction only.

Hoddle originally presented a plan for a grid of 8 blocks long by 3 blocks wide, of which was soon expanded to 8 by 4 to allow for a growing city.

Some blocks were withheld from subdivision, allowing for future civic use, including public buildings and markets.

Streets within the Hoddle Grid were generally named after British dignitaries, and it is quite common for locals to know all street names in order.

Running east to west are Flinders, Collins, Bourke, Lonsdale and Latrobe Street, each partitioned by its respective little street.

Running north to south are Spencer, King and William, Queen and Elizabeth, Swanston, Russell, Exhibition and Spring.

The outlier here Exhibition Street was originally known as Stephen Street and was renamed to celebrate the Melbourne International Exhibitions of the time in 1880 and 1888.

The Hoddle Grid plan lacked any public open space or a public square, which was criticised by the locals.

A plan for the nearby city of Adelaide had been finalised only a year earlier, which looked to incorporate multiple city squares and a ring of parkland directly into its planning.

It was reported that the Governor had discouraged the inclusion of these spaces in the plan for Melbourne to prevent the development of any public democracy that could lead to civil unrest. However, these reports remain unfounded.

It is noted that the New South Wales planning guidelines had focused on square blocks and wide streets, but did not necessarily look to regulate the inclusion of any open space.

Over time, however, many gardens and public open space had been developed in the surrounding areas.

The Hoddle Grid has been subject now to more than 180 years of changing form and policy. City blocks have been further subdivided and amalgamated as the needs of the city developed.

The rear laneway or 'little' street eventually became true street frontages in their own right and instigated further laneway partitions to be developed, providing a patchwork of new lanes and connections across the grid.

Through the latter half of the 20th century Melbourne had developed into a concentric zone model where the Hoddle Grid now housed mostly a commercial and civic area surrounded by a ring of residential neighborhood.

The new laneways developed within the grid primarily facilitating back of house functions, including deliveries and waste collection, but was soon to change when in 1990 the Victorian Government looked to increase the number of people living within the grid and promote more active use for the area.

The Hoddle Grid today provides multi-use offering, with people both living and working side-by-side.

This changing demographic has allowed for Melbourne's laneways to develop into additional commercial and retail space, and has fostered a new cultural identity that includes a prospering cafe and local art scene.

Robert Hoddle went on to plan much of the surrounding area. These new neighborhoods were also laid out over a grid, however were not limited to the geographic constraints of the original Hoddle Grid.

The surrounding metropolitan grid was established with primary streets at an interval of 1 mile and were orientated to magnetic north.

Much of the city was later extended in reference to this arrangement, and with the original Hoddle Grid orientated to the river, it easily remains identifiable on the plan.

Melbourne's Hoddle Grid is home to numerous high-rise and high density developments, in contrast to the mostly low-rise metropolitan area, and today remains the economic and cultural centre of the city greater.

It is the rational and yet adaptable grid plan that was instituted by Hoddle and his peers that we can pay our regards to for the Melbourne of today.

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