wow. this is such an interesting question. Anybody have an answer to nevermore? Archinect should post the question on the cover page... relates a lot also to what Architecture for Humanity wants to do with 'open-source' architecture design and development.

snookers
at this moment its 4:08 am where I'm..(at my workplace ) .

I hope you'r not being funny.

since there are no other responses, i'll just offer what seems like a right answer.

i would guess that there are NOT standards for evaluating beyond those used in the engineering of the infrastructure, i.e., what's the least material/labor for the highest-performing solution = efficiency. this is not going to be something that stays the same from project to project.

assuming that by urban infrastructure you're talking about streets, water mains, sewer mains, electrical grid, sidewalk systems...

Please snookers, get a life.

Nevermore, I agree with Steven – I assume no standards exist, esp. on a global level.

If it works in SimCity, it'll work in real life.

There are engineering/planning standards for urban infrastructure. But they are entirely dependant on the expected demand for that infrastructure.

Nevermore, can you be any more specific? What are you trying to determine?

One source you may consider is the New York City Environmental Quality Review Technical Manual, which outlines the necessary analysis for determining if infrastructure is adequate. (see Chapter L)

http://www.nyc.gov/html/oec/html/ceqr/ceqrpub.shtml

I would agree that there's really no universal standard for laying out infrastructure in any predictable way. Sure, civil engineers lay down highways and suburban roads based on their own standards for capacity, but a responsible urban planner would be more likely to consider environmental and social factors.

While in a building you would know (based, for example, on how many offices there are) how many elevators and emergency stairs you would need, how many accessible restrooms etc. But a city or urban region is a far more complex organism than a single building.

The fascinating thing about transportation infrastructure is that it's designed not only to accommodate existing or future capacity, but can also be used encourage certain development patterns. You can bet that Wal-mart has a few lobbyists specifically targeting highway appropriations. They know that light rail doesn't favor their style of business.

Well this was for a township design project in India. I knew that there was no probable standard for laying out urban infrastructure since everything depends on the country/ function of the township and capacity etc
but was just wondering iwhat IF there were any generic worldwide thumb rules created by someone or some organisation for consideration in urban design :

such as green space /m2 /person or average electric/water consumption /m2/person or road area/m2/person.

anyways,submission is finished.
Thanks a lot folks.