Urban Planning
Mehdi Moeini; Bahareh Ebrahimpour
Abstract
Following the industrial revolution, the development of urbanization, and the expansion of cities, the oldest form of human movement, i.e. walking, was replaced with the use of automobiles. Therefore, the ease of traverse for pedestrians around cities is less significant now than a century ago. Today, ...
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Following the industrial revolution, the development of urbanization, and the expansion of cities, the oldest form of human movement, i.e. walking, was replaced with the use of automobiles. Therefore, the ease of traverse for pedestrians around cities is less significant now than a century ago. Today, there is a growing interest in enhancement of walking habits in urban areas in order to reduce pollution and other problems associated with motor transportation and to improve public health. Therefore, the issue of walking habits has been included on the agendas of many cities. Highlighting its significance, a large number of studies have been conducted around the world and in Iran over the past few decades to address the issue. The increasing trend in the past decade in the publication of high-quality articles addressing the topic of pedestrians demonstrates its importance and the expert concern for it in the field of urban planning and design. The present article aimed to investigate the issue of pedestrians quantitatively and qualitatively, analyzing and interpreting research published in Iran as high-quality articles and to avoid unnecessary replication in the field. It involved meta-synthesis, using encoding to analyze and interpret previous studies. Thisprovided a valuable opportunity for researchers to access an overview of the existing research activity, which could be very useful and effective in definition of research projects and adoption of new orientations on specific topics. The present paper resulted from an investigation of 80 high-quality articles focused on pedestrians, and sought to draft a vision on pedestrian research by studying the structures and contents of relevant high-quality Persian papers. The results of the research indicated that the volume of pedestrian research has been growing rapidly in the past two decades, with orientations toward walkability and footpaths. In most articles focused excessively on footpaths, however, promotion of walkability in cities to a basic level with the aim of improving quality and meeting the needs of citizens has been neglected. In fact, pedestrian research should be focused not only on expansion of footpaths but also on flexibility in promotion of the basic principles of walkability and, consequently, the desire to walk around cities, of which footpaths are only a part. The most important issues found through a review of the existing pedestrian studies include the unnecessary replication of the contents of pedestrian research, repetitive selection of case studies, application of inconsistent terminology, and lack of concern for particular target groups including children, women, and the disabled. The review also indicated that the majority of the studies had been conducted only at the micro-scale (sidewalk-street), and no mention was found of other types of space used for pedestrians, such as neighborhoods. Many articles have dealt with the issue of pedestrians in isolation, while pedestrian studies are part of the research on transportation systems, and need to be linked to investigations of other modes of transportation. Finally, the most common topics associated with the issue of pedestrians were extracted, including activity-behavior, vision and perspective, social issues, environmental qualities, safety and security, health, and tourism. Thus, future research will need to disregard repetitive topics and focus instead on other relevant, influential issues in the area.
Urban Planning
MH Y; A P; Maryam Jami
Abstract
Objectives Today, walking is one of the missing links in urban life. Thus, it is required to review the form and structure of today’s streets, which is a great concern for the urban experts and citizens. Therefore, it is crucial to consider urban pedestrians and find solutions to promote urban ...
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Objectives Today, walking is one of the missing links in urban life. Thus, it is required to review the form and structure of today’s streets, which is a great concern for the urban experts and citizens. Therefore, it is crucial to consider urban pedestrians and find solutions to promote urban environmental quality of life and to promote citizens’ satisfaction with the environment. The city of Sareyn is not an exception. Given the climatic conditions of Sareyn and its high traffic, it cannot attract tourists and residents. These circumstances may pose an obstacle to the development of Sareyn in terms of tourism. Thus, constructing pedestrian walkways could facilitate the revitalization and development process of the city. As a result, this research aims to introduce significant factors in constructing pedestrian walkways in Sareyn, which will be a suitable background to guide the development process of the city. Findings This paper applies the path analysis method to determine the factors affecting the construction of pedestrian walkways in Sareyn. The results of regression analysis method for direct effects indicate that about 64% variance in pedestrian walkways is likely to be explained by research indicators. Variables of walkways and transportation, security, economic functions and urban services and facilities are more significant than other variables in predicting the dependent variable. The second and later stages of the path analysis method measures indirect effects. The results of these stages show that the effect of urban services and amenities on the construction of a pedestrian walkway is 46.3%, it is 11.4% for the transportation criterion, 11% for economic performance, 3% for the socio-cultural criterion and 18.1% for the security factor. Sum of the direct and indirect effects of the independent variables on constructing pedestrian walkways shows that the most effective factor in Sareyn city is related to “Walkways and Transportation” factors. Walkways and transportation affect the dependent variable directly by 0.362% and indirectly by 0.091%. Other effective factors in order of importance are security, urban services and facilities, economic, socio-cultural and geographic functions. Results Path analysis method was used to determine the effective factors on making pedestrian walkways in Sareyn, as a pole of tourism in Iran. Due to the multiplicity of factors, multiple regression test was performed. The direct effects were analyzed in the first step and then the indirect effects were calculated. In the first step, it was observed that research factors explained pedestrian walkway construction by 64%. The most significant factors in this stage were urban services and facilities, transportation, security, socio-cultural and economic functions. The most significant indirect factors were determined to be geographic factors with an indirect path and security with two indirect paths. There were 5 direct and 8 indirect paths in this research. Finally, the most important factors were walkways and transportation, followed by security, urban services and facilities, economic, socio-cultural, and geographic factors. The results show that the improvement of the above factors would make good conditions for constructing pedestrian walkways. Furthermore, the improvement of these factors would have a positive effect on the number of pedestrians using walkways. Finally, improvement of other factors would also have such effects.
khashyar kashanijou; hamed mohammadi; naeime salehi
Abstract
Industrial revolution, urban growth and population increase have greatly affected the area of cities and have caused a staggering increase in the number of automobiles and streets built to facilitate automobile movement. One of the most important problems in urban streets is pedestrian-vehicle ...
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Industrial revolution, urban growth and population increase have greatly affected the area of cities and have caused a staggering increase in the number of automobiles and streets built to facilitate automobile movement. One of the most important problems in urban streets is pedestrian-vehicle interaction at crossings which is a substantial concern for citizens. Installing footbridges has been supported by related organizations in Iran to solve this problem and increase walkability of the streets. In brief, walkability is the attraction level of places for pedestrians’ presence. Based on the opinion of many urban authorities, footbridge is one of the mobility facilities in crossing the streets. Bridges were used to cross the barriers since a long time ago. However, they were built for avoiding automobiles on the streets and their design were upgraded since about half a century ago. This applied research seeks to comparatively evaluate footbridges and pedestrian crossing in relation to walkability. For this purpose, Karim Khan-e-Zand Street in District 6 of Tehran, between Valiasr Square and Haft-e-Tir Square, was selected as the case study. It is a mechanized footbridge at the intersection with Hafez Street. An ordinary (non-mechanized) footbridge has been installed on it at the intersection of Kheradmand Street. The article is based on the analytical-descriptive method. The Analytic Network Process (ANP) is used to evaluate the findings. After studying the theoretical concepts of research through a documentary-library method, appropriate criteria for walkability assessment are weighted by the Delphi method and field data is collected through survey method using questionnaires distributed among 150 citizens. The obtained data was analyzed by Super Decision software package. Three options were considered for citizens to evaluate footbridges in terms of walkability of Karimkhan-e-Zand Street in Tehran: using non-mechanized footbridges, mechanized footbridges and pedestrian crossing. The findings show that security and safety, mobility, accessibility, and physical conditions are respectively more important than other criteria in selecting footbridges for crossing the street. Furthermore, the least important criteria are attraction and comfort of the path and its maintenance quality, respectively. Among the sub-indicators related to security and safety of paths, crime-related security and presence of others were selected as the most effective ones. The length of path is the most important factor while the slope and topography are the least important factors related to the physical condition of the path. Path lighting in night was selected as the most important sub-indicator related to facilities. Also, path continuity and ease of mobility can be referred to as the most important factors among sub-indicators of movement and accessibility. Finally, with regard to the walkability of streets, despite the opinion of urban managers, level crossing with a score of A=0.36 is more favorable than footbridges, and mechanized footbridge with a score of B=0.33 is more desirable than non-mechanized footbridges with a score of C=0.30. Therefore, it seems that a fundamental review is required in the current trend of development of footbridges in Iran.
Urban Design
Azin Mostofi; Hadi Sarvari
Volume 5, Issue 19 , August 2016, , Pages 57-68
Abstract
Abstract
This research attempts to shed light on land use impact on activities and pedestrian behavior. Furthermore, this paper aims to analyze the influential factors on urban street livability and vitality in order to provide a favorable basis to improve behavior diversity in urban public space. Daneshjou ...
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Abstract
This research attempts to shed light on land use impact on activities and pedestrian behavior. Furthermore, this paper aims to analyze the influential factors on urban street livability and vitality in order to provide a favorable basis to improve behavior diversity in urban public space. Daneshjou Street is a case study in this article. This street is located in western Mashhad. Mashhad is the capital of Khorasan_Razavi Province. According to pervious research, all actions undertaken to respond to human needs is considered an activity but behavior is how we do these activities. In this article, the category of Jan Gehl (necessary activities, optional activities, social activities) is used for studying behavior. According to investigation toward land use planning, we can consider frequency of use, the purpose of visits, and functional scales as essential land use properties. All these land use properties have a variety of sub-criteria. The purpose of the visit are a response to secondary needs and primary needs. Land use functional scales have neighborhood scale, regional scales, and district scales. Frequency of use includes once or more visits in a day, once or more visits in a week, once or more visits in a month, once or more visits in a year and visits at uncertain times. In this case study, we determined 5 types of land use:Commercial, Office, Open space (park), Mix-use residential and general service (gas station). This article is trying to answer the following question: "How do different land uses cause different behaviors? It seems that most urban design literature and text books have focused on the effects of different land uses on people‘s activities, and behaviors in urban public space is not studied or only narrowed to pedestrian walkways. This is a qualitative and descriptive analytic research study. The chosen methodology for the study behavior was direct observation and behavior pattern analysis and the methodology for studying land use comprised of observations and questionnaires. The sample size was 138. In Daneshjou Street, there are diverse activities and behaviors; for instance, it was possible to consider Walk to shops, Walk to do something, Transit, Walk to do a job, stand to do something or stand to wait as necessary activities and stroll, sit to eat and drink, sit to read, sit to rest and stand to eat and drink as optional activities. In addition, social activities observed included 2 people or more talking to each other, Cultural events and buying from venders. In Daneshjou Street, Mashhad, the frequency of necessary activities, optional activities and social activities were 29.5%, 33.7% and 36.8%, respectively.. Thus, social activities occurred more frequently than others activities in this case study. Pearson correlation test and chi square test were used for analyzing the information In conclusion, this study proves that land uses with a district functional scale, land uses with more than once a week visit frequency, and land uses responding to secondary needs could provide more variety of pedestrian behaviors in Daneshjou Street.
