Comparative Analysis of Housing Indicators in Informal Settlements (Case Study: Eslam Abade Koshtargah of Urmia)

Due to the increasing urban population and the lack of appropriate planning and insufficient substructure preparation for city dwellers in the third world countries, urban management problems and then informal settlements will emerge and develop gradually. Housing quantitative and qualitative indicators and standards are necessary for achieving minimal social justice and welfare. Housing of informal settlements residents manifests the lack of suitable housing indicators which are useful to be identified in order to help promoting the quality of life for them. City of Urmia is also facing with the problem of informal settlements and Eslam Abade Koshtargah can bereferred to as an example. The physical and social characteristics of informal settlement are much highlighted in housing sector and have its special characteristics. There are also some shortages in infrastructures and urban fundamental services too. This is an applied research that emphasizes the Holistic approach by descriptive and analytical method. It applies field studies, open and closed questionnaires (random sampling), library studies and statistical data from the Statistical Center of Iran according to the content and the subject of the study. Data would end in legal results after being collected and analyzed. There were 13 questionnaires which were calculated by the Cochran formula. This paper is going to do comparative analyses on quantitative and qualitative indicators of housing and also accessibility rate to fundamental infrastructures such as water, electricity, sewerage and etc. in comparison with city of Urmia and similar settlements in the third world countries. The results show that the quantitative and qualitative indicators of housing are unsuitable in comparison with Urmia but it benefits of better conditions in accessibility of fundamental infrastructures and satisfaction level when compared with informal settlements in the third world countries.