Water-sensitive urban design from a social perspective by studying stakeholders in urban geography and changes in their position over time; Case study: Kan catchment in the western part of Tehran

Urban development has affected the quantitative and qualitative decline of water resources. Due to the high subsidence in the southwest of Tehran (about 25 cm per year) because of groundwater depletion and bad water resources management, the Kan basin was considered as a case study. The purpose of this paper is to investigate and explain the position of institutional stakeholders in water resources and cycle management and urban development of the geography of the catchment area from a social perspective and the role of water-sensitive urban design in resolving inter-institutional conflicts.

In this paper, first, urban geography will be studied from the perspective of stakeholder analysis. Then, by studying and presenting a framework, changes in the position of stakeholders in an urban environment over time are investigated. The conflicts between stakeholders in urban geography will be studied regarding the management and engineering of urban water resources. Stakeholder Analysis (SA) and Likert scale (1-5), stakeholders' position and Social Network Analysis (SNA) in Gephi software, institutional relationships' type, and intensity were estimated.

The SA results showed that the power and interest parameters of the Tehran Regional Water Authority (4.026 and 4.282) and Tehran Municipality (3.42 and 3.78) were higher than the other organizations. Besides, the proximity of the values of these two institutions with different utilities indicates a potential conflict. The results of SNA also showed that in the cooperation network, the highest and lowest degrees (Degree) have the Tehran Water and Waste Water Co. and the Tehran Municipality, respectively, which indicates the low interaction of development institutions, especially the Tehran Municipality. Also, in the conflict network, Tehran Regional Water Authority, and Tehran Municipality have the highest degree, and Roads and Urban Development and Health and Medical Education Authority have the lowest degree. Therefore, the high inter-institutional conflict between municipal development and regional water protection institutions indicates the actualization of the conflict ground that was potentially identified with the SA approach.

In this paper, the conflicts between stakeholders in urban geography are studied regarding the management and engineering of urban water resources. Then, using a case study, namely the western part of Tehran, some of the most important conflicts in an urban environment are identified using social network analysis. In other words, in this study, the reasons for the conflict between developing and protecting stakeholders in an urban environment using stakeholder analysis are presented, social network analysis is considered to identify and determine the level of conflict, and Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD)- based approaches are introduced as an essential approach not only to solve the physical problems related to urban water cycle but also as a conflict resolution tool in an urban area. The applicability of the presented approach is studied in the western part of the Tehran metropolitan.